Poland will face consequences if it imposes a tax on big tech companies, the new US ambassador to Warsaw has warned, potentially escalating the post-Starlink dispute between the two countries.
Poland will face consequences if it imposes a tax on big tech companies, the new US ambassador to Warsaw has warned, potentially escalating the post-Starlink dispute between the two countries.
Poland is planning to introduce a new tax on Big Tech, with a plan to be ready within months. It could bring in between PLN 1 billion ($258 million) and PLN 3 billion a year in additional revenue to the budget.
Tom Rose, who President Donald Trump has nominated as the next U.S. ambassador to Poland, called the planned tax “not very smart” in a post on X. The new tax would hurt relations between the two countries, and the U.S. president “will reciprocate as he should,” the ambassador said.
The government does not plan to abandon work on the tax, Polish Digitalization Minister Krzysztof Gawkowski told Radio Zet, calling the intervention “sick,” Bloomberg writes .
“No one — not an ambassador, not a politician, not a big corporate boss — has the right to dictate anything to the Polish government,” said Hawkowski, adding that the tax is not directed against the US technology sector, but against foreign companies that make money in Poland.
"This is a disease," he said. "It turns democracy upside down."
The disputes add to tensions between the government in Warsaw and the Trump administration, which have recently escalated. On Sunday, Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski clashed with Elon Musk over Ukraine's use of the billionaire's Starlink satellite internet system.
Later, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio joined the debate, telling Sikorski that Poland should "thank you, because without Starlink, Ukraine would have lost this war a long time ago, and the Russians would be on the border with Poland right now."
The previous government chose American companies to build Poland's first nuclear power plant, and the future of the next plant hangs in the balance as France fights to win the deal.
Last month, Prime Minister Donald Tusk's administration also announced deals with Alphabet Inc. and Microsoft Corp. to increase their investments in the country.
