Donald Trump said the United States will “immediately start a 301 investigation” in the European Union and is considering a “big TARIFF” in response to fines imposed on American technology companies, days after the European Commission fined Google €890m (about $1bn).
The president posted the threat on Truth Social, a platform he owns. He said the EU would pay a “very high price” for its handling of Google, as well as Apple, Meta and Amazon, which have also been investigated by European regulators.
“The United States of America is not Europe’s “PIGGYBANK”, and we will not allow it to be! Trump wrote. He said any sanctions should be “absolutely withdrawn”.
Trump said the investigation would examine alleged practices by European regulators “to rip off American companies and the American taxpayer”.
Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 gives the Office of the United States Trade Attorney the authority to investigate and respond to foreign trade practices it believes are unfair. According to the Congressional Research Service, this provision allows the USTR to impose tariffs or other import restrictions, withdraw trade agreement agreements, or reach a binding agreement with the foreign government concerned. Trump’s second term administration has launched several such investigations since last year.
The threat of tariffs comes one day after Trump announced new tariffs of between 10 percent and 12.5 percent on 60 trading partners, including the EU, UK and China. Those measures followed the findings of Section 301 on mandatory use in supply chains, which put UK exporters in a new job position.
Last month Trump threatened a 100 percent import tax on any European country that introduced a digital services tax on American tech companies, despite many countries having used such taxes for years. The UK’s digital services tax, which applies to groups with global digital revenue of more than £500m and UK-sourced revenue of more than £25m, raised almost £360m for US tech groups in its first year.
The penalty for Google that created the post was issued by the European Commission for violating the Digital Markets Act. The commission said Google acted in a way that oppressed competitors with its services. Its statement of decision sets out its findings in full.
José Castañeda, a Google spokesperson, told the BBC that the company had “worked hard to comply with the Digital Markets Act” but “expressed our concerns about the impact of recent EC decisions”.
“We appreciate the administration’s cooperation with the US government,” added Castañeda.
In his post, Trump also said that Apple received EU fines of $15bn, Meta $3bn and Amazon $2.5bn. It is not clear where those figures come from.
Amazon has been investigated several times by the European Commission but avoided major fines, reaching an agreement with regulators in 2022 to change some of its practices in Europe. A separate regulator in Luxembourg fined Amazon more than $800m for breaching the General Data Protection Regulation, but that fine was overturned last year.
Meta, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, has been fined several times by EU regulators, including for breaches of user privacy and competition, and faces additional fines for what regulators describe as “addictive” features in its apps. Meta said last year that the EU was “trying to cripple successful American businesses”.
Shortly before he was elected in 2024, Trump said Apple CEO Tim Cook called him directly to complain about the fine the company received from European regulators. The call came shortly after Apple lost a long-running dispute over unpaid taxes.
Google, Meta, Apple and Amazon have donated millions of dollars to fund Trump’s campaign and presidency.
Representatives for Meta, Apple and Amazon, as well as the European Commission, have been contacted for comment.
LinkedIn posts
Donald Trump says the US will open a Section 301 trade investigation into the European Union and is considering higher tariffs, following the European Commission’s €890m fine on Google for breaching the Digital Markets Act.
Trump said the sanctions against Google, Apple, Meta and Amazon should be “completely withdrawn”, saying that European regulators are “hacking American companies”. The threat comes one day after he announced tariffs of 10 to 12.5 percent on 60 trading partners, including the EU and the UK, and a month after he threatened 100 percent tariffs on countries that use digital services tax.
Google said it has “worked hard to comply” with the DMA.
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