The European Commission issued a strong rebuttal on Tuesday to former US President Donald Trump’s criticism of the EU’s new digital services regulations. Trump had previously accused the EU of using these rules to target American technology companies, even threatening additional tariffs unfairly.
The Commission firmly rejected these claims, asserting that the EU has the sovereign right to regulate economic activity within its borders and that its rules are designed to apply equally to all companies operating within the bloc.
The Commission highlighted that recent enforcement actions under the Digital Services Act (DSA) have targeted companies from various countries, including China. Specifically, AliExpress, Temu, and TikTok, all Chinese-owned platforms, have faced enforcement actions.
Furthermore, investigations are underway into X (formerly Twitter) and Meta, demonstrating the non-discriminatory application of the DSA. This directly contradicts Trump’s assertion that the regulations are specifically designed to harm American tech firms.
The Commission also addressed accusations that EU data laws constitute censorship, a claim previously made by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg. The spokesperson clarified that the DSA does not mandate content removal; rather, it requires platforms to uphold their own terms of service and remove content that violates these terms.
The overwhelming majority of content moderation decisions within the EU are made proactively by platforms themselves, based on their established rules and guidelines.
The EU’s position stands in contrast to Trump’s earlier threats of retaliatory tariffs. While the US and EU recently reached a limited agreement to reduce certain tariffs, the issue of digital services regulation remains a point of contention, underscoring the ongoing tension between the two economic powerhouses over the regulation of the digital sphere.
