The Trump administration labeled Australia's proposed news bargaining incentive plan "foreign extortion" and signaled it would consider further action against the measure. The plan would require Meta, Google and TikTok to make deals with Australian news publishers or face a 2.25% levy.

"President Trump is committed to defending America's leading technology sector from digital services taxes and other forms of foreign extortion," White House spokesperson Kush Desai said. He said the U.S. government would examine the details of the plan. "The Trump administration will continue to address these issues with our trading partners," Desai said.

The Computer & Communications Industry Association, a U.S.-based trade group whose members include Meta, Google, Apple, Amazon, Uber and Pinterest, urged the White House to consider retaliatory trade measures. The association called the proposal "discriminatory" with "arbitrary service definitions" and said it singled out predominantly U.S. firms.

"The Incentive is discriminatory in both design and effect, singling out predominantly U.S. firms while distorting digital markets and undermining open internet principles," the association said. "This would effectively function as a coercive levy tied to linking and displaying local news content – what is, in trade parlance, an illegal performance requirement," it added.

Google said the reform was unnecessary and criticized that it did not include AI platforms. Meta said the government's position was simply wrong.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese defended the plan as necessary to protect and reward media outlets for the work they produce. The government stated that companies could avoid paying the levy if they made deals with news publishers.

"I think that whether you're from Bloomberg or from the Fin or the West or Seven, your intellectual property, your work should be valued and someone shouldn't be able to take your work and make a profit from it without payment," Albanese said. "This is property that you are producing. I value your work. I respect the work that journalists do."

Labor's plan is likely to be supported by the Coalition and the Greens in the Australian parliament. Nationals leader Matt Canavan voiced support for making big tech pay for news, while shadow communications spokesperson Sarah Henderson did not endorse the proposed changes.