Countries all over the world have been anxiously awaiting the return of Donald Trump. This week, as Trump retook his position in the White House, the new president also made an appearance at the World Economic Forum in Davos, where his foreign policy goals began to come into view. The first order of business? Declaring (economic) war on Europe, I guess.
At Davos, when questioned about his position relative to the European Union, Trump took the opportunity to blast America’s allies for having the temerity to punish U.S. tech companies for breaking the law.
“They took court cases with Apple and they supposedly won a case that most people didn’t think was much of a case,” Trump said. “They won 15 or 16 billion from Apple. They won billions from Google. I think they’re after Facebook for billions and billions. These are American companies, whether you like them or not. They’re American companies and they shouldn’t be doing that. As far as I’m concerned, that’s a form of taxation.”
“We have some very big complaints with the EU,” Trump concluded, while also doubling down on his plan to impose major tariffs on European countries if they refuse to buy American-made products.
Unlike in America—where the government’s legislative body has largely been co-opted by the special interests it’s supposed to regulate—Europe has a relatively functional legislature that does, occasionally, prove responsive to the public’s interests. In recent years, the EU has passed a number of landmark bills designed to institute sensible regulations on the U.S. tech platforms that dominate the internet. As such, Trump is right: Europe has been hitting American tech platforms with massive fines for their violations of those established laws. Apple was recently hit with a $2.7 billion fine by EU regulators, while Meta was recently fined some $840 million for antitrust violations. Apple also currently owes Ireland something like $14 billion in back taxes. Various regulatory probes into the tech giants are ongoing and it’s plausible that more fines are on the horizon.
Now, as Trump returns to the White House thanks, partially, to money from Silicon Valley, it stands to reason that the big tech platforms currently suffering from European regulatory scrutiny would want it to end. As tech CEOs line up to schmooze with the president, this is surely what companies like Apple, Meta, and Amazon were hoping for.
That said, the MAGA movement and its various allies have been attempting to attack and remake Europe for close to a decade. Rightwing libertarian organizations with ties to Trump have long sought to cultivate ties to European leaders, in an effort to inform their policies and push the traditionally leftist governments further to the right.
During the first Trump administration, MAGA acolyte Steve Bannon headed to Europe, in an attempt to bring his “populist”-style politics to the Old World. To do so, Bannon bought an old Italian monastery and converted it into what he called a “gladiator school,” or, more dramatically, an “academy for the Judeo-Christian West.” The idea was that the monastery would serve as a breeding ground for political parties that could sweep away the established order in Europe and give rise to a new kind of right-wing politics. Bannon, who has longed expressed a desire to destroy the EU, claimed he wanted to fight for the common man, European identity, and, naturally, the free market.
Despite the theatrics, Bannon’s efforts have been largely unsuccessful. Some of the political parties that were formed as part of Bannon’s “movement” have disbanded and Bannon’s “gladiator” monastery hasn’t seen much use, having been tied down by ongoing lawsuits and legal trouble.
In recent months, Elon Musk has attempted to step into Bannon’s shoes and has sought to use his global propaganda platform, X, to seed his own, uniquely moronic brand of rightwing politics in Europe. Like Bannon’s efforts, however, Musk’s propaganda seems to be (mostly) failing. A recent poll found that, in the U.K., where Musk has been incessantly attacking the nation’s prime minister, the tech billionaire was more unpopular than Megan Markle. Another poll found Musk’s popularity was quite low in Germany, where he has been attempting to promote a far-right political party associated with neo-Nazis.
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