Meta could soon get its wish, or at least its reward for pledging fealty to U.S. President Donald Trump, with the Trump Administration now looking to push back against increasingly complex EU regulations that it says are unfairly penalizing U.S. businesses.
Specifically, the U.S. government is set to mount a stronger opposition to Europe’s Digital Services Act (DSA), which imposes a broad range of restrictions, requirements, and penalties on social media platforms over their gathering of user data, and how they use it.
As reported by Reuters:
“President Donald Trump’s administration has instructed U.S. diplomats in Europe to launch a lobbying campaign to build opposition to the European Union’s Digital Services Act (DSA), which Washington says stifles free speech and imposes costs on U.S. tech companies.”
In a letter from U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the administration has accused EU officials of pursuing “undue” restrictions on freedom of expression.
“The cable, whose headline described it as an ‘action request,’ tasked American diplomats across U.S. embassies in Europe with regularly engaging with EU governments and digital services authorities to convey U.S. concerns about the DSA and the financial costs for U.S. companies.”
That’ll be music to the ears of Zuck and Co., who have long been calling for U.S. government assistance to combat what they see as unfair penalties in the region.
Indeed, on average, Meta has been fined more than a $1 billion per year by EU authorities over the past three years running. And that looks set to continue, with the company facing more fines in Italy, among various other pending investigations.
Which is a big reason why Meta has chosen to align with Trump, and implement measures like Community Notes, while scrapping third-party fact-checking, in line with Trump Administration requests.
Meta also appointed Republican Joel Kaplan as its head of global affairs back in January, another move designed to better ingratiate the company with the Trump team, in the hopes that the Trump White House will help it clear more regulatory hurdles, and maximize progress, on various fronts.
Which also means maximizing revenue, and with EU penalties taking away such a big chunk of cash, Meta’s big hope is that Trump himself will step in at some stage and take a stronger stand against increased regulation.
And there have already been indications that Trump may do just that.
Trump recently threatened to halt all trade discussions with Canadian officials over the implementation of Canada’s “Digital Services Tax,” which also takes aim at Meta. That forced Canada to shelve the plan, while government officials have also publicly criticized the DSA, as well as EU regulations relating to AI innovation. Earlier in the year, Trump also threatened European imports with tariffs, in penalty for tech regulations that harm U.S. companies.
It seems that now, the U.S. government is moving to take a stronger stance on this front. And while the main impetus of the communication is the protection of free speech, it does seem like it could become a bigger battle, which could force EU regulators back down on at least some of their provisions.
Would that lead to a better outcome for users?
I mean, it’s hard to say. Some of the EU regulations seem to have only penalized the platforms themselves, with limited harm to users, while other protections ensure greater control, which could have a broader impact.
But overall, the concern is that regulatory groups are using more and more measures to penalize Meta for its success, and feed some of the money that it takes in via its dominant ads business back into local markets.
Arguments can be made for both sides, but either way, it does seem like the stage is being set for a larger political showdown over EU rules.
