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The U.S. has imposed travel restrictions on former European Union Commissioner Thierry Breton and four other individuals, alleging their involvement in “censorship” and pressure on American social media sites.

This decision comes in the wake of the Trump administration’s criticism of the EU’s Digital Services Act, which mandates stricter content moderation by major tech firms, and the Digital Markets Act, designed to limit their influence.

“For too long, European ideologues have orchestrated efforts to pressure American platforms into suppressing viewpoints they disagree with,” stated U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on X.

Rubio emphasized that the U.S. is actively working to prevent key figures of what he calls the “global censorship-industrial complex” from entering the country, adding that this list could expand if no changes are made.

Thierry Breton, who served as the EU commissioner for internal markets from 2019 to 2024, is being barred due to his prominent role in drafting the Digital Services Act. U.S. Under-Secretary of State Sarah Rogers highlighted Breton’s insistence that X’s owner, Elon Musk, must adhere to regulations concerning illegal content as a key factor in the decision.

Breton responded by asking if the 1950s US era of “witch-hunts” against suspected communists was back. 

The European Commission said it “strongly condemns” the US travel ban and had requested clarifications from Washington. It vowed to “respond swiftly and decisively to defend our regulatory autonomy against unjustified measures”.

“The EU is an open, rules-based single market, with the sovereign right to regulate economic activity in line with our democratic values and international commitments,” it added.

French President Emmanuel Macron said the sanctions were an act of “intimidation” against European digital sovereignty.

The digital regulation “was adopted at the end of a democratic and sovereign process by the European parliament and the council. It applies in Europe to ensure fair competition between platforms, without targeting any third country, and to enforce online the rules that already apply offline,” he said.

Rogers said the other people under sanctions were part of a “censorship-NGO ecosystem”.

Washington also banned four people from non-profit campaign groups that work to detect problematic, fake or violent content or hate speech online.

They are Imran Ahmed, head of the UK and US-based Center for Countering Digital Hate; Clare Melford, head of the London-based Global Disinformation Index; Anna-Lena von Hodenberg, founder of Berlin-based HateAid; and Josephine Ballon, co-leader of HateAid. 

Echoing his European counterparts, Johann Wadephul, German foreign minister, said on X that the punitive measures, including on the chairs of HateAid, were “not acceptable”.

President Donald Trump’s administration has demanded changes to EU tech rules and threatened to impose tariffs in retaliation for the bloc’s actions against Silicon Valley groups. The commission has said its tech regulations are non-negotiable and objectively applied.

In recent months, the commission has opened probes into Amazon and Microsoft’s dominance in the cloud sector, launched investigations into the artificial intelligence models of Google and Meta’s WhatsApp, and handed out a €120mn fine to Musk’s X for breaking digital transparency rules.

Additional reporting by Paola Tamma