US Government Intervenes in X's Challenge to EU Fine

The U.S. government is seeking to join Elon Musk's legal challenge against a €120 million European Union fine imposed on X, formerly known as Twitter. The fine, issued in December 2025 by the European Commission, stems from the platform's policy of allowing users to pay for a blue verified check mark, which the Commission argued deceives users by not genuinely verifying account ownership.

In a filing with the EU's General Court, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) stated that the Commission had "inappropriately attempted" to extend its authority to American companies beyond its jurisdiction. Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate argued that the U.S. has a "clear interest" in ensuring that any Commission decision aligns with the established principles of international law regarding territorial jurisdiction and does not negatively impact U.S.-headquartered digital services that significantly contribute to the American economy.

Musk, a vocal critic of EU tech regulations, has previously asserted that such rules hinder technological progress. The DOJ's intervention is based on a section of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the EU, which allows a state to intervene in legal disputes if it can demonstrate an interest in the case's outcome.

The European Commission's fine also cited X's alleged failure to provide transparency around its advertising and its restriction of researcher access to public data. At the time of the fine, Henna Virkkunen, the Commission's executive vice-president for tech sovereignty, stated that X was being held responsible for undermining user rights and evading accountability, adding that deceptive practices and restricted data access have no place online in the EU.

This action marked the first official non-compliance decision under the EU's Digital Services Act (DSA). The EU is also investigating other aspects of X's operations, including concerns about its AI assistant Grok being used to generate inappropriate images.

U.S. figures, including Senator Marco Rubio and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), had previously criticized the EU regulator, accusing it of targeting and censoring American companies. Rubio had posted on X that the fine was an "attack on all American tech platforms and the American people by foreign governments."