The European Union has issued a strong rebuke after the United States imposed visa restrictions on five Europeans linked to the regulation of major technology firms, among them former EU commissioner Thierry Breton (main image).
The backlash followed an announcement by the US State Department on Tuesday that it would refuse entry visas to five European citizens, alleging they had attempted to ‘coerce’ American social media companies into suppressing views they disagree with.
Spain, France and Germany joined Brussels in condemning the move.
In a statement, the European Commission said: ‘We have requested clarifications from the US authorities and remain engaged. If needed, we will respond swiftly and decisively to defend our regulatory autonomy against unjustified measures.
‘Our digital rules ensure a safe, fair, and level playing field for all companies, applied fairly and without discrimination,’ it added.
Breton, who until 2024 oversaw technology policy at the Commission, was frequently at odds with Silicon Valley executives, including Elon Musk, over compliance with EU law.
The State Department has labelled him the ‘mastermind’ behind the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA), legislation that sets content moderation and transparency requirements for large online platforms operating in the bloc. ALSO READ: Court orders Meta to pay Spanish media companies nearly half a billion euros for ‘unfair competition’.
Under the DSA, major platforms are required to justify moderation decisions, provide greater transparency for users and grant researchers access needed for work such as assessing children’s exposure to harmful content.
However, the law has become a flashpoint for US conservatives, who argue it enables censorship of right-wing viewpoints both in Europe and internationally — a claim the EU strongly rejects.
‘The Trump Administration will no longer tolerate these egregious acts of extraterritorial censorship,’ US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a post on X on Tuesday.
Spain’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it ‘expressed its solidarity with former EU Commissioner Thierry Breton and with the leaders of civil society organisations fighting against disinformation and hate speech, in light of the visa restrictions imposed by the US, which constitute unacceptable measures between partners and allies’.
‘A safe digital space, free from illicit content and disinformation, is a fundamental value for democracy in Europe and a responsibility for all,’ it said.
Germany’s foreign minister, Johann Wadephul, responded on X the following day, saying: ‘The DSA was democratically adopted by the EU for the EU – it does not have extraterritorial effect.’
The visa bans, he added, ‘are not acceptable’.
French President Emmanuel Macron also criticised the decision, writing on X: ‘France condemns the visa restriction measures taken by the United States against Thierry Breton and four other European figures.’
‘These measures amount to intimidation and coercion aimed at undermining European digital sovereignty,’ he said, adding that Europe would defend its ‘regulatory autonomy’.
Breton’s successor as commissioner for the internal market, Stéphane Séjourné, said on X that ‘no sanction will silence the sovereignty of the European peoples’.
The visa restrictions also apply to Imran Ahmed of the Center for Countering Digital Hate, along with Anna-Lena von Hodenberg and Josephine Ballon of HateAid, a German organisation the State Department described as acting as a trusted flagger under the DSA.
Clare Melford, head of the UK-based Global Disinformation Index (GDI), was also included.
HateAid described the US move as ‘an act of repression by an administration that increasingly disregards the rule of law and tries to silence its critics with all its might’.
A spokesperson for GDI said that ‘the visa sanctions announced today are an authoritarian attack on free speech and an egregious act of government censorship’.
They added that the measures were ‘immoral, unlawful, and un-American’.
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Is McCarthy’s witch hunt back? 🧹
— Thierry Breton (@ThierryBreton) December 23, 2025
As a reminder: 90% of the European Parliament — our democratically elected body — and all 27 Member States unanimously voted the DSA 🇪🇺
To our American friends: “Censorship isn’t where you think it is.”
Europa es indisociable de la libertad de expresión. Es parte de nuestra soberanía. https://t.co/zoKtBIQOqa
— José Manuel Albares (@jmalbares) December 24, 2025
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