U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday threatened countries with digital taxes with ‘subsequent additional tariffs’ on their goods if they do not abolish these regulations.
Sources had previously indicated that the Trump administration is considering imposing sanctions on officials of the European Union or member states responsible for enforcing the Digital Services Act adopted by the Union.
Many countries, particularly in Europe, have introduced taxes on revenue from sales to digital service providers, including Google of Alphabet, Facebook of Meta, Apple, and Amazon.
This issue has long irritated American administrations.
– With this truth, I inform all countries with digital taxes, legislation, rules, or regulations that if these discriminatory practices are not abolished, I, as President of the United States, will impose significant additional tariffs on exports from those countries to the U.S. and introduce restrictions on the export of our highly protected technology and chips – Trump stated in a social media post.
In the post, Trump claimed that such regulations are ‘designed to harm or discriminate against American technology’ and that they benefit companies of America’s technological rival, China.
Trump has also previously threatened to impose tariffs on countries like Canada and France due to disagreements related to digital service taxes.
In February, Trump ordered his chief trade official to renew an investigation related to the imposition of tariffs on imports from countries that charge digital service taxes to American technology companies.
EC Rejects Trump’s Threats
It is the sovereign right of the EU and its member states to regulate economic activities on their territory, is the response of the European Commission to U.S. President Donald Trump’s threats to impose tariffs on all countries that have regulated the activities of American technology companies.
