Elon Musk insults and tries to ridicule European Commissioner Thierry Breton

© Shutterstock/Kemarrravv13

This Monday, August 12, the Tesla boss exchanged with Donald Trump for more than 2 hours in a Space on X, formerly Twitter. But a few hours before, he received a warning regarding the Digital Services Act (DSA) from Thierry Breton, European Commissioner for the Internal Market.

A meme to respond to Thierry Breton

The legislation, which has been in force since February, aims to combat all hateful content and disinformation online. It sets out an additional framework to be respected by services considered to be very large online platforms. That is, among others, those who claim more than 45 million users within the European Union (EU).

” As the individual entity ultimately controlling a platform with more than 300 million users worldwide, a third of whom are in the EU, which has been designated as a very large online platform, you have a legal obligation to ensure X's compliance with EU law “, warned Thierry Breton in a letter sent to Elon Musk and shared on X.

The message clearly did not have the desired effect. The billionaire was quick to respond to Breton using, as usual, a meme. ” To be honest, I really wanted to respond with this meme from Tropic Thunder (editor's note: a movie released in 2008), but I would NEVER do something so rude and irresponsible! ,” Musk replied. The message is accompanied by a very ambiguous image:

Linda Yaccarino, CEO of also reacted by calling the letter “ an unprecedented attempt to extend a law supposed to apply in Europe to political activities in the United States ”.

Relationships already strained

And she is not the only one who thought so. Donald Trump supporters have criticized Thierry Breton's approach, but so have representatives of the European Union. According to Politico, several of them said they were surprised by the letter. Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, was not warned in advance by the Commissioner.

For their part, Thierry Breton and Elon Musk have already spoken several times in recent years. While the discussions seemed cordial at the start, notably with a visit by the European Commissioner to a Tesla factory, they recently became more heated in the context of the application of the DSA.

And this episode is unlikely to improve relations between Elon Musk and the European Union. X has already been criticized several times for violating the DSA. Last month, for example, the Commission claimed that the blue badges awarded to X Premium subscribers were misleading.

Thierry Breton has not spoken since Elon Musk’s salty response to his missive, but this is not the first time he has warned the entrepreneur. No real sanction has been issued yet.

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