Zuckerberg asks Trump to intervene over EU fines on US tech firms

President-elect Trump should push back on efforts in Europe and other countries to crack down on the US tech industry, according to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.Zuckerberg, who has scrambled to ingratiate himself with Trump since the president-elect’s win in the 2024 presidential election, made the case for stronger government support during an appearance on “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast last Friday.“I think it’s a strategic advantage for the United States that we have a lot of the strongest companies in the world, and I think it should be part of the US strategy going forward to defend that,” Zuckerberg said.“It’s one of the things I’m optimistic about with President Trump is, I think he just wants America to win.”EU antitrust officials have imposed a series of harsh fines totaling “more than $30 billion” over the last decade or so, Zuckerberg added.

Last July, the EU charged Meta with violating its sweeping tech competition law – which could ultimately result in fines of up to 10% of its global revenue, or nearly $13.5 billion.Zuckerberg, who met with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, argued the fines are “almost like a tariff” and have become “sort of like an EU-wide policy for how they want to deal with American tech.”“If some other country was screwing with another industry that we cared about, the US government would probably find some way to put pressure on them, but I think what happened here is actually the complete opposite,” Zuckerberg said.Trump has historically clashed with Zuckerberg and Meta – once referring to Facebook as “a true enemy of the people” and repeatedly accusing the social media giant of censorship and election interference.However, Zuckerberg has taken several steps to mend fences with the incoming administration – including appointing a Republican as the company’s top policy executive, ending fact-checking programs and killing DEI initiatives that have long irritated conservat...