In the past, the EU has not hesitated to try to apply European law to tech companies. Over the past decade, for example, Google has faced three fines totaling more than $8 billion for breaking antitrust law (though one of these fines was overturned by the EU’s General Court in 2024).

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Tuesday sharply criticized Elon Musk's backing of the right-wing parties in the European Union, calling it "really disgusting" and said it was hindering democracy in the bloc.

I would prefer to stay out of politics,” Elon Musk told his followers in 2021, on the platform then known as Twitter. Plenty has changed since then. The world’s richest man appears to have a new goal: upending Europe.