Exclusive: Trade Rep. Greer pushes Europe to ease tech regulation

What they're saying: "People differ on how big tech should be treated," Greer told Axios' Mike Allen on Tuesday.

• "What I can tell you is we're not going to let Europe control the global regulation of our companies, which generally give a lot of free services to consumers and provide a lot of consumer welfare."
• "So, whatever challenges we may have with these companies, and they are real, and we want to cover them, we're just not going to let Europe be the arbiter."

Catch up quick: The EU has ramped up enforcement of antitrust laws and tech regulations, leading to massive fines for Apple, Meta and Alphabet.

• European countries have also discussed imposing digital services taxes on American companies they say pay disproportionately low income taxes in those markets.
• Trump threatened to levy a 100% tariff in June on all goods from any country that imposes such a tax.
• The European Commission shot back shortly after, noting that "any taxes are non-discriminatory by design and apply ​equally to all ​large companies, regardless of their ‌origin."

Zoom out: Greer said America is fundamentally "pro-business, and we're pro-innovation," which is why the U.S. built the largest and most competitive tech companies.

• "The Europeans have not," Greer said.
• He isn't asking other countries to scrap their entire regulatory system, he said, but he expects them to "limit their enforcement because they're just gone wild with enforcement, well beyond what they need to do."
• He also objected to regulations that "only apply to you if your global revenue is above X, or you have X business model, and it only … tends to capture our guys. It's crazy."

Go deeper: WATCH: Axios House DC

Editor's note: This story was updated throughout.