US warns EU over alleged discrimination against American service firms

The US trade representative on Tuesday accused the EU and several of its member states of pursuing what the administration described as a sustained campaign of discriminatory legal and regulatory actions against American service providers.

In a statement, the trade representative said the EU has engaged in "a continuing course of discriminatory and harassing lawsuits, taxes, fines, and directives" targeting US service companies, despite what it characterized as years of US efforts to raise concerns through diplomatic and trade channels.

"U.S. services companies provide substantial free services to EU citizens and reliable enterprise services to EU companies, and they support millions of jobs and more than $100 billion in direct investment in Europe," it said.

It said the US concerns have been raised repeatedly "without meaningful engagement or basic acknowledgement" from EU authorities.

"In stark contrast, EU service providers have been able to operate freely in the United States for decades, benefitting from access to our market and consumers on a level playing field," it said, citing several major European companies that have enjoyed broad access to the US market, including Accenture, Amadeus, Capgemini, DHL, Mistral, Publicis, SAP, Siemens, and Spotify.

"If the EU and EU Member States insist on continuing to restrict, limit, and deter the competitiveness of U.S. service providers through discriminatory means, the United States will have no choice but to begin using every tool at its disposal to counter these unreasonable measures," it said.

The statement added that US law allows for the assessment of fees or the imposition of restrictions on foreign services if necessary, and warned that similar actions could be taken against other countries that adopt what it described as an "EU-style strategy" toward US service providers.

The statement came on the heels of the EU earlier this month imposing a €120 million ($140 million) fine on US social media company X, owned by sometime Trump administration ally Elon Musk, over violations of the bloc's Digital Services Act. The US has threatened countermeasures over the fine.