EU-US Tech Clash Intensifies Over Platform Regulation

The Slate Bureau

A State Department inquiry found no evidence that EU member states were misusing the Digital Services Act (DSA) to suppress or criminalize online speech - yet the Trump administration continues to press its case against Brussels, leveling accusations of censorship.

The probe centers around the DSA, a sweeping piece of legislation passed in 2022 that took effect on November 16 of that year. The law established a unified legal standard across the European Union, placing new obligations on online platforms, social media networks, search engines, and other digital service providers. At its core, the act seeks to address how these companies manage illegal content, uphold transparency, and protect user safety within EU borders.

According to The Washington Post, despite the inquiry's findings clearing member states of wrongdoing, White House shows little sign of softening its stance, setting the stage for a deepening transatlantic standoff over the future of digital regulation. “There is no evidence that Member States of the European Union are overreaching the DSA to censor and criminalize online content,” the report quoted the investigation finding. Nevertheless, some European researchers have been banned from entering America by the Trump administration, while federally funded programs designed to counter foreign disinformation have been quietly shut down, according to the report.

The European Union’s Digital Services Act requires platforms to quickly remove illegal content and allows users to appeal against content‑moderation decisions. The Slate has learned that Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has registered Freedom.Gov, a web portal that is being developed by the United States Department of State to help internet users in Europe, China, and other countries to access content that is blocked or censored by their own governments.

A staff report released on July 25 by the Republican majority on the House Judiciary Committee took direct aim at the European Union's flagship digital law, framing it as a vehicle for censorship rather than a tool for online safety. Titled "The Foreign Censorship Threat," the report charged that the DSA, while presented as a measure to make the internet safer, functions in practice as a far-reaching censorship mechanism — one that hands European regulators the power to silence speech they find objectionable, wherever it occurs in the world. The Republican-authored document pulled no punches, branding the law an "anti-speech, Big Brother" instrument.

"The threat to American speech is clear: European regulators define political speech, humor, and other First Amendment-protected content as ‘disinformation’ and ‘hate speech,’ and then require platforms to change their global content moderation policies to censor it," the report said.

Brussels pushed back firmly. EU officials argued that their digital rules are designed to protect, not erode, free expression- with enforcement focused squarely on genuinely illegal material, including content tied to terrorism and the sexual exploitation of children. Far from targeting legitimate speech, the bloc insists, the DSA exists to make online platforms safer and more accountable for the content they host.

Within weeks of returning to the White House, Donald Trump wasted little time signaling his administration's intentions toward European digital policy. On February 21, 2025, he signed a memorandum putting both Brussels and London on notice, indicating that Washington would be examining whether EU or UK policies were pressuring American companies into curbing free expression or enabling censorship. The memo specifically called out two of the EU's most consequential pieces of digital legislation, the Digital Markets Act and the Digital Services Act, warning that both would come under close administration scrutiny for the way they govern how U.S. firms engage with European consumers.

“The Administration will review whether any act, policy, or practice in the European Union or United Kingdom incentivizes U.S. companies to develop or use products and technology in ways that undermine free speech or foster censorship. The regulations that dictate how American companies interact with consumers in the European Union, like the Digital Markets Act and the Digital Services Act, will face scrutiny from the Administration," the Memorandum said.

Even a softer touch in enforcing the DSA is unlikely to cool the ideological fire that has taken hold in Congress and the White House over Europe's approach to regulating online speech, the Atlantic Council's Europe Center had cautioned last year. If anything, the council warned, the friction between Washington and Brussels on this front looks set to intensify rather than ease.