logo
Calm before EU-US trade storm as deadline approaches, Newsletter

Calm before EU-US trade storm as deadline approaches, Newsletter

Euronews21-07-2025
Key diary dates
In spotlight
MEPs will be in their constituencies for the Parliament's last full business week before the summer this week, apart from a few who are heading to the US on missions.
Delegations from the committees for budgets and foreign affairs will both visit Washington DC, and the visits come at a sensitive moment. US President Donald Trump has told European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen he intends to raise tariffs on European products to 30% starting 1 August – the end of next week – while the Commission claims to remain ready to work on an agreement before that date. "We of course remain fully and deeply engaged in the negotiations, and technical work continues to reach a mutually beneficial agreement by 1 August," said a Commission spokesperson.
The budget committee delegation will meet officials from the US Departments of Treasury and State and members of the Congress and Senate. They have a range of issues on the table relating to the finance, EU and US defence funding, Ukraine reconstruction plans and the impact of the USAID funding termination.
The Parliament Vice-President leading the delegation, Romanian socialist Victor Negrescu, said that the mission 'comes at a crucial moment for reinforcing the transatlantic partnership through a budgetary lens', and is looking forward to 'discussions with our American counterparts on shared challenges - be it strengthening our industrial base, developing a Transatlantic Erasmus, securing our supply chains, or ensuring a fair digital transition.'
Meanwhile the delegation from the Committee on Foreign Affairs will also be in Washington DC this week as part of its first official visit to the US since last year's Parliament elections and Donald Trump's return to the White House, where they will hold meetings in Congress and the US State Department on EU-US political relations.
Neither the US Congress or Senate or the European parliament has any direct heft in the ongoing trade negotiations however, and the it seems likely that the dispute will simply hover ominously in the background of any discussions.
Everything they are discussing depends on any outcome to the trade negotiations, however. How much the EU and US are prepared to cooperate on 'shared challenges' and EU-US political relations will depend wholly on whether the outcome is stable or destructive.
By the end of next week the two sides will either resolve on normalisation of trade relations, albeit with tariffs playing a fundamental role, or descend into an ugly high-tariff retaliatory stand off that seems destined to harm both sides, and render any dialogue between EU and US lawmakers redundant.
Policy newsmakers
Drive for child protection online
The European Commission offered online platforms further guidance last week on how to protect minors, addressing issues such as addictive design, cyber bullying and harmful content in a bid to ensure that children enjoy high levels of privacy, safety and security. The largest online platforms should not have any issues implementing looming age verification solutions, Denmark's digital minister told Euronews later in the week in response to heavy lobbying around online child protection measures by the tech industry. 'They are the biggest companies in the world, with a bigger economy than most of our countries could ever dream of. I think they will manage to find a solution,' said Caroline Stage Olsen.
Policy Poll
Will the EU and US reach a trade deal before August 1st?
Yes
No
Vote
Orange background

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Comments

No comments yet...

Related Articles

EU fails to agree Israeli suspension from research fund over Gaza
EU fails to agree Israeli suspension from research fund over Gaza

Euronews

time15 minutes ago

  • Euronews

EU fails to agree Israeli suspension from research fund over Gaza

A European Commission proposal to deny Israel partial access to the EU's €95 billion Horizon Europe research fund failed to garner the necessary qualified majority support when EU ambassadors met in Brussels on Tuesday to discuss the issue. If agreed, Israel would lose access to €200 millions' worth of future grants and investments in Horizon's European Investment Council (EIC) which specialises in so-called disruptive technologies. But representatives from Berlin and Rome said they need to examine Commission's proposition further. For a qualified majority vote to pass the population weight of either Italy or Germany is required. "Germany wanted to continue dialogue with Israel as opposed to taking action – but we all know the dialogue is not working," a source at the meeting told Euronews. Another diplomat said Germany, which has opposed any sanction against Israel, was now "holding the cards' in relation to the decision. Both Germany and Italy said they needed more time and would let the EU know if they come to a different position in the coming weeks, according to two sources familiar. Hungary, Bulgaria and Czechia were opposed to taking any action, according to the sources. The Netherlands, Ireland, France, Luxembourg, Slovenia, Portugal, Malta and Spain all supported the Commission's plan with several saying they would also push the EU for stronger sanctions, potentially in trade, the sources said. The Commission's motion to suspend Israel's participation in Horizon is in response to an EU report finding the country had breached human rights obligations in the EU-Israel Association Agreement. After this finding the two sides came to an agreement that Israel would "substantially" increase access to civilians for food and medicine within the enclave to prevent the EU taking action for the breach. However, the EU says there has been no material improvement for Palestinians, and according to EU sources, the EU has not been able to independently verify the claims from Israel that it is allowing more trucks of aid to reach the starving population. EU officials have so far been prevented from going into Gaza to make their own assessment of the situation. "I didn't receive any convincing explanation as to why I couldn't go into Gaza," a senior official said. Meanwhile, the UN and other agencies say humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza worsens by the day, and over 130 people have died from hunger alone; 88 of them children and infants. On Monday, two prominent Israeli NGO's B'Tselem, and Physicians for Human Rights, Israel, issued a report claiming Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. As ambassadors met on Tuesday, the death toll for the entire war hit over 60,000 people according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health ministry. 81 people were killed by Israel on Tuesday alone; 32 while seeking aid, the ministry said.

Trump administration pushes to reverse scientific ruling behind climate regulations
Trump administration pushes to reverse scientific ruling behind climate regulations

France 24

timean hour ago

  • France 24

Trump administration pushes to reverse scientific ruling behind climate regulations

President Donald Trump 's administration on Tuesday moved to reverse a foundational scientific determination that underpins the US government's authority to limit greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles and, more broadly, to combat climate change. Speaking at an auto dealership in Indianapolis, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin argued that the 2009 Endangerment Finding was based on flawed reasoning and had inflicted serious economic harm. "If finalized, today's announcement would amount to the largest deregulatory action in the history of the United States," said the former Republican congressman. He was joined by Energy Secretary Chris Wright, a former fracking company CEO, whose department published a climate science study cited in the EPA action. The proposed reversal -- first announced in March -- will be subject to a 45-day public comment period and is certain to face legal challenges. While Zeldin cast the move as a way to undo what he called the " Biden - Harris administration's electric vehicle (EV) mandate," revoking the Endangerment Finding could also unravel the legal basis for a wide array of climate regulations, including those on power plants and oil and gas operations. In his remarks, Zeldin accused the EPA under former president Barack Obama, a Democrat, of making "mental leaps" in determining that heat-trapping gases posed a threat to public health and welfare. The EPA said in a press release that the finding had "been used to justify over $1 trillion in regulations" and undoing it would save $54 billion annually. A 302-page document outlining the rationale for the revocation makes a number of bold claims around climate science, including the assertion that "extreme weather events have not demonstrably increased relative to historical highs," citing the Energy Department report. It also speaks about the "beneficial impacts" of carbon emissions on plant growth and agricultural productivity. The Endangerment Finding was grounded in overwhelming scientific consensus and peer-reviewed research. It followed a landmark 2007 Supreme Court ruling that found greenhouse gases qualify as air pollutants under the Clean Air Act and directed the EPA to revisit its position. Transportation accounts for 28 percent of US greenhouse gas emissions -- more than any other sector. If it were a country, the US transportation sector would rank as the fourth largest emitter of greenhouse gases globally, while the power sector would be fifth. Legal battle looms Environmental groups and states are expected to swiftly sue. The case could ultimately reach the Supreme Court, which may need to overturn its own 2007 precedent to side with the current Republican administration. Dan Becker of the Center for Biological Diversity told AFP the Endangerment Finding has survived multiple legal challenges by industry over the years, "but this time, it's the government itself mounting the attack." "Hopefully they will recognize that this is science and not politics -- that there was a good reason for that precedent and no good reason to revoke it," said Becker. "But this is a very political court." He added that the administration's cost-saving arguments were misleading, pointing to official data showing that rules now targeted for repeal saved the average American driver $6,000 in fuel and maintenance over the lifetime of vehicles built under the standards. Camille Pannu, an environmental law specialist at Columbia University, told AFP the Trump administration had failed to present robust legal arguments grounded in scientific evidence in its proposal. "I think they're hoping they can just refuse to regulate for four years and do crazy things during that time while it's all tied up in court," she said. Since returning to office, Trump has withdrawn the US from the Paris Agreement and launched a sweeping campaign to expand fossil fuel development. The announcement comes as tens of millions of Americans are baking under a brutal heat dome in the Southeast, while climate-fueled flooding earlier this month killed more than 100 people in Texas.

'Marathon at F1 speed': China bids to lap US in AI leadership
'Marathon at F1 speed': China bids to lap US in AI leadership

France 24

timean hour ago

  • France 24

'Marathon at F1 speed': China bids to lap US in AI leadership

Assumptions that the US was far ahead in the fast-moving field were upended this year when Chinese start-up DeepSeek unveiled a chatbot that matched top American systems for an apparent fraction of the cost. With AI now at the forefront of the superpowers' tech race, the World AI Conference (WAIC) that ended Tuesday saw China set out its case to take charge on shaping its global governance too. China, the United States and other major economies are "engaged in a marathon at Formula One speed", said Steven Hai, assistant professor of tech innovation at Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University. "Which country will attain the upper hand can only be assessed dynamically over the course of development." China and the United States dominate the AI sector -- only 10 to 15 percent of models developed in recent years were built without either's participation, according to Epoch AI, a non-profit research institute. While US companies like Google and OpenAI are still industry-leading, the institute labelled 78 percent of Chinese models "state-of-the-art" compared to 70 percent of models built with American participation. Beijing's stated aim is to become the world's leading AI "innovation centre" by 2030. "Now China is neck-and-neck with the United States in terms of core tech, that play (for global leadership) is more relevant than ever," said Tom Nunlist, associate director for tech and data policy at Trivium China. "With a solid AI offering and the US turning inward, the question is will Beijing's vision gain greater global traction?" In May, Microsoft's Brad Smith told the US Senate that "the number-one factor" in the tech race "is whose technology is most broadly adopted in the rest of the world". 'Sovereign AI' China's offer is technical and economical. "One of the biggest differences (with the US sector) is that most of the leading models in China... are open-weight and open-source," former Google CEO Eric Schmidt told an audience at WAIC. That means they can be adapted by other countries to fit their own needs, said George Chen, partner at Washington-based policy consultancy The Asia Group. "We already see some countries like Mongolia, Kazakhstan, even Pakistan are trying to adopt the DeepSeek model to build their own," he said. "China has a chance to win in the aspect of sovereign AI to export its model to those countries." The comparative low cost of Chinese technology -- software but also hardware, for example through firms like Huawei -- will be a big factor, especially for developing countries, Chen added. On Monday another Chinese start-up, Zhipu, announced its new AI model -- also open-source -- would cost less than DeepSeek to use. In June, OpenAI accused Zhipu of having close ties with Chinese authorities and noted it was working with governments and state-owned firms across Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Africa. "The goal is to lock Chinese systems and standards into emerging markets before US or European rivals can," it said. Washington has moved to protect its lead in AI, expanding efforts to curb exports of state-of-the-art chips to China in recent years. "While limiting China's share of the global AI hardware market, (these measures) have accelerated indigenous innovation and led Chinese firms to exploit regulatory loopholes," said assistant professor Hai, referring to "rife" smuggling and circumvention. Issues of trust? Other challenges to homegrown firms include the closed nature of the Chinese internet, and "general issues of trust when it comes to using Chinese tech", Trivium's Nunlist said. At WAIC, China sought to present itself as a responsible power. Premier Li Qiang emphasised the risks of AI and pledged to share technology with other nations, especially developing ones. His remarks contrasted sharply with US President Donald Trump's aggressive low-regulation "AI Action Plan" launched just days before and explicitly aimed at cementing US dominance in the field. China released its own action plan at WAIC, following a meeting attended by delegates from dozens of countries. Li also announced the establishment of a China-led organisation for international AI cooperation. However, China's foreign ministry did not respond to a request from AFP for details on the set-up of the organisation -- including any international participants -- and several foreign delegates said they had not been briefed on the announcement beforehand. Analyst Grace Shao wrote it was clear AI was still in its "infancy stage". "You can sense that vibrant energy but also the immaturity of the space," she wrote on Substack.

DOWNLOAD THE APP

Get Started Now: Download the App

Ready to dive into a world of global content with local flavor? Download Daily8 app today from your preferred app store and start exploring.
app-storeplay-store