Tim Apple, Engage!
While we already know that various Big Tech executives had been kissing the ring of giving a ring to Donald Trump ahead of the election, now that it's over and somehow Trump returned, how fast will those same executives be tripping over each other to get him back on the line?
First and foremost on that list should probably be Apple. As the EU is once again threatening to do EU things to the company – and soon, clearly trying to set up a DMA fine as outgoing European Commission competition commissioner (that's a mouthful) Margrethe Vestager is set to leave her post this month. While I thought a comically vague threat back in September may be her last stand against the company, this fine seems like it will be her attempt to have the last laugh.
Apple may now have someone who can help with that...
To date, the US government has – rather oddly, in my opinion – failed to interject while the EC has put in place rule after rule targeting, very clearly and specifically, US tech companies. With the threat of fines being imposed on worldwide revenue, the vast majority of which comes from within the US. To quote another President, James Bennett, from the film version of A Clear and Present Danger, "This is our money, tell them that."
In fact, I've used that quote before, nearly a decade ago, when the EU started demanding that Apple pay billions of dollars in "unpaid" taxes to Ireland. At the time, I thought the US would step in to note that this money was, in fact, going to be taxed when Apple repatriated it into the US. That never happened. Instead, Apple actually just paid that fine – $14.4B! – which took a huge bite out of their bottom line this past quarter.
That issue may or may not have been what led Tim Cook to call Donald Trump. Per reports, Cook vented his displeasure about the way the EU was singling out Apple – maybe the great American tech company, is an angle you can imagine was thrown out there – with their politics and regulation. If that's true – which Trump himself put out there – the idea would be that Cook was appealing in advance to a would-be-again President Trump to help the company out with the annoying EU gnats. This is Trump's good old friend, Tim Apple, after all.
Mr Trump said he told Mr Cook he would not let the EU "take advantage of our companies", but he needed to "get elected first".
Step 1: complete.
The high level here is a notion I put out there back in March, when the EU was ramping their rhetoric and action against Apple. While I wondered at what point it might make sense for the company to pull back actual products from the market (ahead of them postponing – some perhaps indefinitely – AI roll-outs in the EU), I also closed with an idea from where my title sprung, Apple's Trump Card:
Or maybe, just maybe, a newly re-elected President Trump would come to the rescue in some way. The EU is trying to harm an American company? Fear not, Tim Apple...
He's back, baby. Both Tim Apple and Trump. And now is the time. While Trump won't be sworn back into office until January, Apple will obviously be able to postpone any payment of a fine for far longer – see again: the Irish tax situation – and that will give Trump plenty of time to look at the situation and act accordingly.
The main issue from Apple's perspective must be the air of quid-pro-quo that always wafts around Trump, President or not. Simply making America great again may not be enough here. Tread carefully, Tim Apple.
One more thing: You know who is not the biggest fan of Apple? The man who now clearly will have the ear of Trump on all things tech: Elon Musk. This spat dates to the Apple Car/Telsa days. That could add a wrinkle here...
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler