"Trump's "America First" agenda made people ditch US tech for Europe"

Tuta has released a report saying a lot of people are ditching US tech and switching to European alternatives, and in the company's words, it is all thanks to President Donald Trump and his "America First" agenda, calling it "our best sales pitch."

Tuta, if you have not heard of it, is a German company offering a secure, end-to-end encrypted email and calendar service with a strong focus on privacy. Tuta claims that, unlike mainstream providers, it blocks all ads and trackers, encrypts nearly everything, including subject lines and calendar events, and runs entirely on open-source software.

The company says it's had a pretty big year so far. Paying customers jumped over 80% in the first half of 2025 compared to early 2024, with growth accelerating more than four times faster than it did during the same period last year. Even the free user count went up by 25%.

So, why are people ditching US tech? According to Tuta, it has a lot to do with Trump’s policies, especially the wave of tariffs he pushed through this year. Another example Tuta points to is what happened with Chief Prosecutor Karim Khan from the International Criminal Court.

Khan's email account was reportedly disabled by Microsoft at the request of the US government, due to sanctions connected to an ICC investigation into Israeli actions in Gaza. After that, he moved to Proton Mail, a Swiss provider.

Tuta believes people have just started feeling pretty uncomfortable depending on Silicon Valley tech, given how often these platforms become tangled in political drama. This growing unease, according to the company, is encouraging people to "Go European," a movement now running right alongside the "deGoogle" trend, which saw many leaving Big Tech for privacy reasons.

The EU itself has similar concerns, wanting to move away from cloud services like Azure since US laws like the CLOUD Act let American authorities access data even if it's stored in Europe.