When we saw Elon Musk walking into the Twitter head office with a sink a little over two years ago, did we expect things to escalate this quickly? It is sinking in what an existential threat to democracy we face here in Europe when tech billionaires go rogue. When, on 20 January, President Trump was sworn in, a tech bro J.D. Vance was at his side, and the Big Tech oligarchs sponsored the festivities. On the selective guest list were Trump’s extreme right friends like Giorgia Meloni. There is a transatlantic alliance being forged aimed at weakening the EU in favour of nationalism and giving free rein to the tech companies’ owners to continue enhancing their grip on our economy and our lives through their brand of surveillance hyper-capitalism.

Put this in perspective to what happened in the last month alone: the Romanian elections were overturned because of the foreign interference and disinformation through TikTok, Musk is openly supporting the AfD in the German election and is using his platform X to promote them, and Mark Zuckerberg announced that he will stop fact-checking in the US. The Meta’s CEO urged the incoming Trump administration to push back on the European rules aimed at stopping disinformation from becoming a systemic risk and accused the EU of promoting censorship. For the upcoming four years, Big Tech will sit at the table in the new US administration with Musk appointed to lead a new Department of Government Efficiency. EU leaders must prepare for a standoff with Trump over regulating tech in Europe.

In that sense, the silence from the European Commission has been deafening. In this game with bullies from the other side of the Atlantic, the new Commissioner in charge, Henna Virkunnen, Executive Vice President for Tech Sovereignty, Security and Democracy, should show strength and determination. If they smell fear, this will quickly escalate, and the credibility of the EU as a leading force in regulating big tech will be squandered. Besides the direct attacks on our democratic electoral processes, as we have seen in Romania and now Germany, this has a broader implication for the rule of law in Europe. We are all equal under the law, whether online or offline, even if you own the digital social media platforms.

We all know that social media platforms play a crucial role in our democracies and the integrity of elections by influencing how information is shared and perceived. Already in 2018, 83% of respondents a European survey acknowledged that fake news, which is broader spread on social media, represented a danger to democracy. And this is why, We spent the last legislative term creating a digital rulebook with the Digital Service and Market Acts and the AI Act, to name a few. All this EU tech legislation aims at counter disinformation and illegal content, tackle online harassment or ensure the security of minors, as well as protect European values, and our democracy in light of the gatekeepers of the digital world, all of whom are non-European firms. We would be making a fool of ourselves if we did not even sovereignly enforce our common European rules when the first difficulties arose.

The Digital Services Act forces X and Meta to identify risks to democracy and freedom of speech and to take necessary actions. The European Commission has been investigating X for some time, but the threat to our democracy and the urgency of the matter obliges the Commission to deliver strong responses to protect our rights and values truly. We need to speed up these procedures, especially in light of German elections on 23 February, if we want to ensure the integrity of the electoral process. The Digital Services Act provides strong sanctions, and the Commission must not be afraid to apply them. Refraining from imposing a 6% global turnover fine would only demonstrate that this Commission is at the order of a foreign government defending its own companies against our rules and our democracies. If so, the future Commission’s democracy shield would look ridiculous if they don’t even apply our own European rules.

The Commission cannot apply an EU-wide ban in Europe like Brazil did to force X to respect its laws. However, it can ask Member States to apply this option if it is justified. German authorities could consider Musk’s interference with the current elections as grounds to block X.

But all this may not be sufficient to counter the behaviour of tech oligarchs with their own social media platforms. A free and democratic Europe cannot rely on foreign companies to provide essential platforms. We are making this call because, as progressives, we have been pushing for the strongest protection possible for our fundamental rights under the DSA and the AI Act and this fight continues.

If blocking platforms becomes a serious policy option, we need to provide Europeans with alternatives so that they can still enjoy freedom of speech in a safe, inclusive and respectful online environment. This requires investment in developing a European ecosystem, a Eurostack of digital infrastructure, that provides an EU-made and democracy-proof alternative social networking platform. We have the technical knowledge and capacity, so it is only a matter of political courage and sufficient investment to build a democracy-friendly platform.

Besides fact-checking, we need to invest in fact-telling, as we did in earlier times with quality news on television and radio. It’s high time we apply this to the online world and create a safe digital public space where quality journalism can find its place. The Commission is already financing some projects in this direction and can scale this up, but it will require direct results in the coming year.

Soon, we will know if the Trump administration will put the Digital acquis in the mix of his aggressive approach to trade and tariffs. Hearing Vice-president Vance threatening to reduce Nato support when Europe acts on Elon Musk and X’s disregard for our rules is a forebode of what might come. However, the EU cannot bow down and should not allow itself to be blackmailed and threatened. For that, the risk to our democracy and the fallout of not applying rules to powerful individuals and their companies is too big. The new European Commission, especially Commissioner Virkkunen, will need to stand up in the name of all Europeans to the tech oligarchs and their friends in the White House. Either we fight, or we fold. We, Socialists & Democrats, made our choice.

Iraxte García Pérez and Alex Agius Saliba are the president and the vice president of the Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament