Bipartisan House Group Asks Biden to Act on ‘Unfair’ EU Bill

President Joe Biden should demand changes to the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), which discriminates against U.S. tech companies, Reps. Suzan DelBene, D-Wash., and Darin LaHood, R-Ill., wrote Wednesday in a letter with some 30 other members of Congress. The group noted the administration has recently engaged with the EU to revise its proposed DMA ahead of potential adoption next month. Originally announced in 2020, the DMA regulates self-preferencing and other competition issues associated with Big Tech. It establishes a "set of narrowly defined objective criteria for qualifying a large online platform" as a gatekeeper. As drafted, the DMA would “single out” American companies by restricting their activity in Europe while favoring European companies, the lawmakers wrote in their letter. The EU’s approach “unfairly targets American workers by deeming certain U.S. technology companies as ‘gatekeepers’ based on deliberately discriminatory and subjective thresholds,” they wrote. The DMA’s discriminatory aspects violate “fundamental principles” of the World Trade Organization, they argued. Reps. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif.; Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill.; and Doris Matsui, D-Calif., signed. The White House didn’t comment.