Trump Threatens 100% Tariff on Any Country Imposing Digital Services Tax on US Companies
WASHINGTON. President Donald Trump on Friday threatened to impose a 100% tariff on all goods imported from any country that levies a digital services tax on American technology companies, escalating a simmering transatlantic trade dispute that threatens to unravel last year’s hard-won US-EU trade agreement.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump specifically singled out European nations that he said are on the verge of implementing such taxes.
“Numerous European Countries have been discussing the imminent implementation of a Digital Services Tax on American Companies. Some of these Countries are close to actually doing this,” Trump wrote.
“Please let this statement serve to represent that any Country that imposes such a Tax will immediately be met with a 100% TARIFF on any and all Goods sent to the United States of America,” he continued. “This TARIFF will supersede Trade Deals made with the Country, whether implemented, signed, or not.”
The sweeping language effectively threatens to override the US-EU trade deal struck in July 2025, which capped US tariffs on most European goods at 15% in exchange for the European Union eliminating tariffs on US industrial goods. That agreement, negotiated between Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen at Trump’s Turnberry golf resort in Scotland, was hailed at the time as averting a full-blown transatlantic trade war.
EU countries had only recently met Trump’s July 4 deadline to reduce tariffs on American goods, a condition of the deal.
At the center of the dispute is France’s digital services tax, first enacted in 2019. The 3% levy applies to companies with more than 25 million euros in French revenue and 750 million euros in global revenue, a threshold designed to capture major Silicon Valley firms such as Google, Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft. The tax generated roughly 756 million euros in collections during 2024.
French lawmakers proposed doubling the rate to 6% last year, though the measure was ultimately vetoed. Nevertheless, French President Emmanuel Macron has refused to back down. In an interview with French television channel TF1 last week, Macron said France would not bow to pressure, stating, “No, because that is not how it works.”
Trump had already threatened France with a 100% tariff on French wine and champagne earlier this month, telling the New York Post on June 15 that he had directly urged Macron to drop the levy. “All he has to do is get rid of the sales tax, and he wouldn’t have that kind of pressure,” Trump said at the time.
Friday’s broader threat extends the tariff warning to any European Union member state that moves forward with a digital services tax. The US Trade Representative has long threatened France, the United Kingdom, Austria, and Spain with retaliatory tariffs over their respective digital tax proposals, arguing they unfairly target American companies.
The Trump administration views digital services taxes as discriminatory measures that undermine US sovereignty over corporate taxation. European governments counter that global tech companies must pay taxes proportional to their revenue and user activity within their jurisdictions, closing loopholes that have allowed billions of dollars in profits to be routed through low-tax countries.
The confrontation also underscores a pattern of US pressure yielding results. Canada’s new government under Prime Minister Mark Carney rescinded its planned digital services tax in June 2025, just days before it was set to take effect and trigger a $2 billion retroactive bill for US tech companies, after Trump terminated trade talks over the levy. The move cleared the way for negotiations to resume on a Canada-US trade and security deal.
Whether European nations will follow Canada’s example remains unclear. Macron’s public defiance, combined with France’s status as the EU’s second-largest economy, suggests a protracted standoff. Several European countries have been coordinating their approach to digital taxation at the OECD level, though progress on a multilateral framework has been slow.
Trump’s latest ultimatum leaves EU leaders facing a difficult choice: abandon their digital tax ambitions and risk domestic political backlash, or face a punitive 100% tariff that would decimate exports across a wide range of industries at a time when European economies are already under strain.
– George, 1ban.news