US President Donald Trump responded to the European Commission’s antitrust fine of Google by threatening to “nullify the unfair penalties” in a Truth Social post on Friday.
On Friday afternoon, the European Commission announced a €2.95 billion fine against US tech giant Google for violating its competition laws in the digital ads market – an investigation the EU had open since 2021.
Trump criticised the decision in a post on Truth Social on Friday and said that “my Administration will NOT allow these discriminatory actions to stand,” referring to the fine.
The fine was “effectively taking money that would otherwise go to American investment and jobs,” he asserted.
Trump threatened to “start a Section 301” in response to the Commission announcement, referring to US trade laws that could lead to the imposition of tariffs and other restrictions on the EU. He said that he intends to open the proceeding to “nullify the unfair penalties charged to these taxpaying American companies.”
According to the US government’s website, only three countries are subject to investigations under Section 301, China, Nicaragua and Brazil.
Just last month, Trump had warned countries against enforcing their digital rules against American big tech companies – but he did not single out the EU at the time. He said he would retaliate against countries with “substantial additional tariffs” and export restrictions on critical US technology and semiconductors.
The European Commission at the time had cautioned not to “speculate”.
While presenting the fine against Google on Friday, a Commission spokesperson also insisted that the fine against Google was separate from the EU-US trade discussions.
(cp)