EU looks to target Big Tech in trade war with America

Author:
Jakob Hanke Vela

Europe is ready to get creative to win the next bout of trade war against America.

The EU is preparing a law that could allow its executive body, the European Commission, to hit back against U.S. tariffs by imposing sanctions on the intellectual property of companies such as Amazon, Google and Facebook.

In a rare united front, Europe's main political groups on July 6 backed proposals to strengthen the EU's trade powers by expanding them into the realm of services and intellectual property rights, which they argue would allow them to match U.S. trade firepower.

“I’m satisfied to see that there is big support for Europe to muscle up,” Marie-Pierre Vedrenne, who authored the draft law, told POLITICO.

Vedrenne, from the centrist Renew Europe group, has the backing from the center-right European People's Party and the center-left Socialists and Democrats. All argue that it is time to radically modernize the EU's trade arsenal.

The article's full-text is available here.

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