The US government is seeking to join a legal challenge led by Elon Musk to overturn a €120m European Union fine imposed on the platform X over its blue tick verification badges.
In December 2025, the European Commission penalized the platform, stating that it deceives users by selling verified check marks without meaningfully verifying account identities.
The US Department of Justice filed an application with the EU’s General Court to support the dismissal efforts brought forward by Musk and X.
US Assistant Attorney General Brett A. Shumate argued that the commission has improperly attempted to expand its regulatory authority to American corporations outside its jurisdiction.
The justice department stated that the US has a direct interest in ensuring regulatory decisions align with international standards of territorial jurisdiction and do not prejudice US digital services supporting the American economy.
European Commission spokesperson Thomas Regnier responded during a briefing that the regulator is fully prepared to defend its position in court, citing a solid case under the Digital Services Act. A state may intervene in disputes before the court if it “can establish an interest in the result of the case to the court”, it claims that under a section of law in the Statute of the Court of Justice of the EU. According to henna Virkkunen, the regulator’s executive vice-president for tech sovereignty,, At the time of the fine’s issue it was “holding X responsible for undermining users’ rights and evading accountability”.
The initial penalty marked the commission’s first official non-compliance decision under the Digital Services Act, with regulators also criticizing X for ad transparency issues and blocking researcher access. In addition to its use of blue ticks, EU regulators had accused X of failing to provide transparency around its adverts and denying researchers access to public data. Obscuring information on ads and shutting out researchers have no place online in the EU,” she said, deceiving users with blue checkmarks.
High-ranking US officials, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, criticized the penalty as an assault on American technology companies and citizens, while the European Commission maintained it is simply enforcing standard digital and democratic rules. Musk, who spent millions helping elect Donald Trump and other Republicans, has previously claimed EU tech regulation “inhibits progress” for companies. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) had criticised the EU regulator, accusing it of attacking and censoring US firms. It’s an attack on all American tech platforms and the American people by foreign governments,” Rubio wrote in a post on X, the European Commission’s fine isn’t just an attack on X.
Alongside the blue tick dispute, EU authorities are pursuing additional investigations into X, including a separate inquiry into its Grok AI assistant regarding the generation of unauthorized sexualized imagery.
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