🔗 Share this article

Can European leadership ever confront the US administration and US big tech? The current lack of response is not just a legal or financial failure: it constitutes a ethical collapse. This inaction calls into question the very foundation of the EU's political sovereignty. What is at stake is not only the fate of companies like Google or Meta, but the fundamental idea that Europe has the right to govern its own online environment according to its own laws.

The Path to This Point

First, consider the events leading here. In late July, the European Commission agreed to a humiliating deal with the US that established a permanent 15% tax on European goods to the US. The EU received nothing in return. The embarrassment was compounded because the commission also agreed to provide more than $1tn to the US through financial commitments and acquisitions of energy and military materiel. This arrangement exposed the vulnerability of the EU's dependence on the US.

Soon after, Trump threatened severe new tariffs if the EU implemented its regulations against American companies on its own territory.

The Gap Between Rhetoric and Action

Over many years Brussels has asserted that its market of 450 million rich people gives it unanswerable leverage in international commerce. But in the six weeks since Trump's threat, Europe has taken minimal action. No counter-action has been implemented. No activation of the recently created trade defense tool, the so-called “trade bazooka” that Brussels once vowed would be its ultimate protection against external coercion.

Instead, we have polite statements and a fine on Google of less than 1% of its yearly income for longstanding anticompetitive behaviour, already proven in US courts, that allowed it to “abuse” its market leadership in the EU's advertising market.

American Strategy

The US, under Trump's leadership, has signaled its goals: it no longer seeks to strengthen European democracy. It seeks to weaken it. An official publication released on the US Department of State's platform, composed in paranoid, bombastic language reminiscent of Hungarian leadership, accused Europe of “an aggressive campaign against Western civilization itself”. It condemned alleged limitations on authoritarian parties across the EU, from German political movements to PiS in Poland.

Available Tools for Response

What is to be done? The EU's trade defense mechanism works by assessing the extent of the coercion and applying retaliatory measures. Provided EU member states agree, the European Commission could remove US products out of the EU market, or impose tariffs on them. It can remove their intellectual property rights, block their investments and require compensation as a requirement of re-entry to Europe's market.

The instrument is not only financial response; it is a statement of determination. It was created to demonstrate that the EU would never tolerate external pressure. But now, when it is most crucial, it lies unused. It is not the powerful weapon promised. It is a paperweight.

Political Divisions

In the period leading to the EU-US trade deal, many European governments used strong language in official statements, but failed to push for the instrument to be used. Some nations, such as Ireland and Italy, openly advocated a softer European line.

Compromise is the last thing that Europe needs. It must enforce its regulations, even when they are inconvenient. In addition to the trade tool, the EU should shut down social media “recommended”-style systems, that recommend content the user has not asked for, on European soil until they are proven safe for democratic societies.

Comprehensive Approach

Citizens – not the algorithms of foreign oligarchs serving foreign interests – should have the autonomy to make independent choices about what they view and distribute online.

The US administration is putting Europe under pressure to weaken its digital rulebook. But now especially important, the EU should hold large US tech firms accountable for anti-competitive market rigging, surveillance practices, and preying on our children. Brussels must ensure Ireland accountable for not implementing Europe's online regulations on US firms.

Enforcement is insufficient, however. The EU must gradually substitute all non-EU “big tech” services and computing infrastructure over the next decade with European solutions.

The Danger of Inaction

The real danger of the current situation is that if Europe does not act now, it will never act again. The more delay occurs, the more profound the decline of its confidence in itself. The increasing acceptance that resistance is futile. The more it will accept that its laws are unenforceable, its governmental bodies not sovereign, its democracy not self-determined.

When that occurs, the path to authoritarianism becomes unavoidable, through automated influence on social media and the acceptance of misinformation. If the EU continues to cower, it will be pulled toward that same decline. Europe must act now, not just to push back against Trump, but to create space for itself to exist as a independent and autonomous power.

Global Implications

And in doing so, it must make a statement that the international community can see. In North America, South Korea and East Asia, democratic nations are watching. They are wondering if the EU, the last bastion of liberal multilateralism, will resist foreign pressure or yield to it.

They are asking whether democratic institutions can survive when the leading democratic nation in the world turns its back on them. They also see the model of Lula in Brazil, who confronted Trump and showed that the approach to address a aggressor is to hit hard.

But if the EU delays, if it continues to issue diplomatic communications, to levy token fines, to anticipate a improved situation, it will have effectively surrendered.