Elon Musk slammed the EU after it slapped a fantastic on his social media platform X for violating transparency guidelines, warning his response would goal the highest officers behind the penalty.
“The ‘EU’ imposed this loopy fantastic not simply on [X], but additionally on me personally, which is much more insane!” the billionaire Tesla CEO wrote on X. “Due to this fact, it will appear applicable to use our response not simply to the EU, but additionally to the people who took this motion towards me.”
The rebuke comes after the European Fee on Friday imposed a €120 million fantastic on Musk’s platform for breaching transparency obligations it faces as a really giant on-line platform underneath the EU’s Digital Companies Act, the bloc’s flagship content material moderation regulation.
The EU govt mentioned the platform’s blue checkmark characteristic was misleading after it was modified from denoting verified customers right into a paid characteristic. It additionally mentioned X’s promoting library lacks transparency, and that it fails to supply entry to public knowledge for researchers.
A Fee official mentioned the chief has discovered three entities behind X; X Holdings Firms, xAI and Elon Musk “on the prime.” Fee spokesperson Thomas Regnier mentioned the fantastic is “for a breach dedicated by X” however “addressed to the complete company construction.”
“The EU woke Stasi commissars are about to know the total that means of the ‘Streisand Impact,'” Musk fumed. The “Streisand impact” refers to when an try and hold one thing discreet backfires.
Musk didn’t elaborate on what kind his response to the X levy would take or which people he would goal straight.
The fantastic on X and its proprietor has already drawn a pointy rebuke from Washington, with U.S. officers depicting the bloc’s transfer as an assault on broader free speech rights, with some alleging that U.S. firms had been being singled out.
Vice President JD Vance criticized the fantastic after particulars leaked forward of time. “The EU ought to be supporting free speech not attacking American firms over rubbish,” Vance mentioned.
When requested about Vance’s remarks, the Fee’s Govt Vice President for Tech Sovereignty Henna Virkkunen informed reporters: “The DSA is having to not dowith censorship, this determination is concerning the transparency of X.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, in a Friday put up on the platform, mentioned the fantastic “isn’t simply an assault on [X], it’s an assault on all American tech platforms and the American folks by overseas governments. The times of censoring Individuals on-line are over.
Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau added to the criticism, saying that the “nations of Europe can not look to the US for their very own safety on the similar time they affirmatively undermine the safety of the US itself via the (unelected, undemocratic, and unrepresentative) EU.”
Trump’s EU envoy Andrew Puzder additionally slammed the penalty.
The “extreme €120M fantastic is the results of EU regulatory overreach focusing on American innovation,” Puzder wrote on X. “The Trump Administration has been clear: we oppose censorship and can problem burdensome laws that focus on US firms overseas. We count on the EU to have interaction in honest, open, & reciprocal commerce — & nothing much less.”
The transfer provides one other layer of pressure to the EU’s strained relationship with the Trump administration, with the U.S. president threatening to impose further tariffs on the bloc if it continues to penalize American tech giants. The subject has been a theme of tense commerce talks in current months, with the U.S. pushing Brussels to scrap the DSA, together with different enforcement measures.
Whereas the fantastic was cautiously praised in Brussels and different European capitals, the place officers had fearful that the EU govt would bow to calls for that it rein in its enforcement of U.S. tech corporations, some European politicians extra aligned with the U.S. agenda joined in on the criticism.
“No person elected you,” wrote far-right Dutch firebrand Geert Wilders. “You characterize nobody. You’re a totalitarian establishment and might’t even spell the phrases freedom of speech. We should always not settle for the fining of [X], however abolish the [Commission].”
The fantastic was solely the conclusion of the primary a part of the EU’s probe into X, which may also take a look at the content material circulated on the platform.
X didn’t instantly reply to request for remark.