1 week Ago By Gerard Fageda
United States and the European Union But the trade war between the two major powers is far from over. After freezing tariffs on US products, Ursula von der Leyen warned Donald Trump that the European Commission remains prepared to counterattack with all kinds of measures and has openly targeted his major US technology companies. , such as Meta –parent company of Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram–, X, Google and Apple.
The President of the European Commission had already warned that the EU has a legal mechanism called which allows for responding to a trade offensive with extraordinary measures and through express legal means. However, in an interview with the newspaper , the German leader has gone a step further and has specified that the European bloc could punish the By raising taxes on the huge profits they make in the EU market. "We can apply a tax on the revenue they earn through advertising for digital services," the head of the EU executive specified.
The first member state to propose this countermeasure option was France, and the vast majority of European partners insist that the EU must be willing to use all the tools at its disposal. Furthermore, it could be approved without unanimity—only a qualified majority is required—and, therefore, Viktor Orbán's Hungary could not veto it, as it has done with other initiatives that have almost absolute support within the blog. On the other hand, Von der Leyen continues to maintain influence in the Trump administration and is open to relaxing European regulations to reach a trade agreement with the United States, which is one of the White House's requests.
"I am open to looking at how we can align our rules and standards to facilitate business," the president of the European Commission responded. Furthermore, another option Brussels could pursue is restricting the entry of US companies into public tenders for European governments. An opportunity to negotiate At the EU Economic Ministerial meeting this Friday in Warsaw, the vast majority of member states closed ranks with Brussels and validated the truce the European Commission announced in the United States on Thursday.
Thus, completely aligned with the EU executive, European finance ministers agreed that the partial postponement of Trump's general tariffs represents an opportunity to negotiate with Washington and avoid an escalation of the trade war. "It represents a first step toward a negotiated solution," said Spanish Economy Minister Carlos Cuerpo..
