WASHINGTON Dec 1 At a conference following talks with French leader Emmanuel Macron, he acknowledged the imperfection of the American inflation reduction law, which angered Europe, but refused to apologize for it.
«The United States does not apologize, and I, the author of this law, will not apologize.. «Sometimes when you write a massive piece of legislation that provides almost $360 billion as the biggest investment in climate change in history, it can fail and require changes to be agreed upon,» Biden said.
«Never, when I wrote the law, our goal was to exclude those who cooperate with us,» the US President assured journalists and his French counterpart, recognizing that there are flaws in the law that need to be corrected.
The French president has previously openly expressed dissatisfaction with the statutory stimulus measures against American electric car manufacturers, which actually infringe on the opportunities of European manufacturers in the American market. On Wednesday, in Washington, Macron expressed his displeasure with US lawmakers and business representatives. According to the French leader, the law is contrary to WTO rules and is «unfriendly.» in the US, batteries made from locally sourced materials. The document, which the administration calls the Inflation Reduction Act, allocates $370 billion for clean energy and climate goals, $64 billion for lowering the cost of medicines and health insurance.
The EU called this act discriminatory against similar products imported from other countries. European Commissioner for the Internal Market Thierry Breton said he does not rule out the introduction of retaliatory measures if the US does not revise the business support measures prescribed in the inflation reduction law.