France Rebukes E.U.’s Trade Deal With Trump

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A day after the European Union and United States struck a trade deal on Sunday, the French government has come out swinging against the agreement, calling instead for tariff retaliation and warning that Europe would be politically weakened if it didn’t hit back.

“It is a dark day when an alliance of free peoples, gathered to affirm their values and defend their interests, resolves to submit,” Prime Minister François Bayrou wrote on X about the deal, which imposes 15 percent tariffs on European imports to the United States, but lowers barriers in European countries for American imports.

France had been leading a charge in Europe to retaliate against the United States ahead of the deal, after an earlier threat by Mr. Trump to impose a punishing 30 percent tariff on the Europeans. Mr. Trump’s on-again, off-again tariff threats had galvanized President Emmanuel Macron in particular, who said the European Union had no choice but to present a show of force.

Mr. Macron has yet to comment on the trade deal, but the sharpened attacks by a phalanx of his closest cabinet members were in line with his increasingly confrontational position toward Mr. Trump on key trans-Atlantic issues. Last week, Mr. Macron said his government would recognize a Palestinian state, setting France apart from the United States and most of its close allies, and risking friction with Mr. Trump.

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