Meta’s global policy director, Joel Kaplan, has stated that the company “won’t shy away” from appealing to President Donald Trump if the EU enforces digital regulations that unfairly target its products.
Kaplan, a longtime Republican strategist appointed by Mark Zuckerberg as Meta’s chief of global affairs after Trump’s re-election, stated at the Munich Security Conference that it is up to the Trump administration to determine whether EU fines against U.S. tech companies are unfair.
However, he emphasized that Meta will defend itself if it believes it is being unfairly targeted.
“When companies are treated differently and in a way that is discriminatory against them, then that should be highlighted to that company’s home government,” Kaplan told a panel moderated by Stephanie Flanders, head of economics and government at Bloomberg, in the Bavarian capital Sunday,” Kaplan said.
“While we want to work within the confines of the laws that Europe has passed — and we always will — we will point out when we think we’ve been treated unfairly.”
Trump has placed EU fines on U.S. tech companies on his trade agenda, calling them a “form of taxation” during a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos last month.
He also mentioned “some very big complaints with the EU”, signaling potential trade tensions over the issue.
Kaplan spoke as U.S.-EU tensions escalated at the Munich Security Conference, where Vice President JD Vance led the U.S. delegation.
Vance criticized EU regulations on social media, arguing they restrict free speech, especially when applied to far-right groups advocating on issues like migration.
While EU authorities defend social media restrictions as a tool to combat hate speech and misinformation, Kaplan sided with Vance, arguing that these rules threaten free expression.
He also highlighted Meta’s Community Notes, a feature that allows users to fact-check content on its platforms.
“We don’t want misinformation,” Kaplan said. “People have different perspectives of what is misinformation and what is not.”
Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, has repeatedly clashed with the EU’s digital regulations.
It has been fined over €2 billion ($2.1 billion) for violations of antitrust and data protection rules under the bloc’s strict regulatory framework.
