US Embassy seeks rapporteur to postpone regulation of digital markets at the request of big techs

Economic advisor Matthew Lowe and digital economy economic associate Flora Lindsay-Herrera participated in the meeting. According to Machado, Lowe said he requested the meeting at the request of the companies and asked for more time before voting on the project. He did not present any specific demands, criticisms or proposals. "They came to ask for more time, to say that the companies came to them, asked for their help, and that it was not the time to vote", explains Aliel Machado.

To the report, the embassy's press office said that it does not comment on "private diplomatic conversations". The report also questioned which big techs contacted diplomats with requests to postpone the analysis of the text, but there was no response to this.

Apple said that the proposal is unnecessary and “will create a worse experience for Brazilian users and developers”. According to the company, the project "would force changes that users never requested, while at the same time it could harm Brazil's thriving app economy."

When contacted, Amazon and Google said they would not take a position. OpenAI and Microsoft were contacted by email on Thursday (9), but did not respond.

The bill under discussion creates the Special Superintendence of Systemic Relevance, Free Competition and Consumer Protection in Digital Markets within Cade (Administrative Council for Economic Defense) to identify companies and services that need to be monitored to avoid anti-competitive practices.

Among the proposed measures are prohibiting the favoring of own products and limiting competitors' access to users and data, in addition to ordering greater transparency in the functioning of algorithms. The Ministry of Finance prepared the text, one of the priorities of the Lula (PT) government.

The meeting with the deputy was requested a week earlier, on June 30, the day Machado participated in a meeting to explain the project to the leaders and the president of the Chamber, Hugo Motta (Republicanos-PB).

The office was contacted via email by senior economic advisor Francisco Sadeck, who asked for more details and said that Amazon had commented to the embassy that the project would be modified.

Aliel Machado had met with four company representatives days before, when he shared some of the changes that would be in the proposal to leaders.

The person who represented the deputy in the meeting with the Americans was the cabinet coordinator. Initially, the deputy was expected to be present, but the meeting of leaders that would address changes to the project was delayed.

This was the second meeting between the cabinet and the embassy since the PV federal deputy took over as rapporteur in October last year.

In November, the congressman received representatives from the United States, including Matthew Lowe, and heard the same requests to postpone the analysis of the project. About seven months have passed since then.

At that time, the companies' fear was the approval of an urgent request, which speeds up the processing and allows direct voting in the plenary. The rapporteur committed to only presenting the new project after talking to the companies and discussing the matter in detail.

Since taking on the role of rapporteur, Machado has met with representatives of big techs such as Apple, Google, Microsoft and OpenAI, both in the office and on international trips to countries such as the United States and England.

Still at the end of 2025, he went to Japan and met government authorities and representatives from the public and private sector to exchange "experiences on public policies for regulating digital markets, economic competition, technological innovation and institutional governance", explains the report that describes the trip.

He also paid a visit to Microsoft's Japanese headquarters. "The meeting contributed to expanding understanding of the private sector's perspective in relation to public policies under discussion in Brazil and Japan", says the report.

This context of dialogue was repeated to the embassy representatives at the last meeting to justify that the project had been widely debated and, therefore, could be voted on.

"I fulfilled the commitment, we listened, we met, I traveled a lot, I spoke with companies, with the government, with party leaders. We put together a preliminary report, which is public. We are open to new contributions for anyone who wants to talk", said the deputy to the report.

The project that regulates digital markets has been urgently being processed since March this year, when, despite opposing pressure from big techs, the application was approved. The rapporteur officially presented the new version of the text on Wednesday (8).

Since the end of June, big techs have intensified pressure against the project, as shown by Folha de S. Paulo.

On Tuesday (7), Alai (Latin American Internet Association), which represents several technology companies, released a letter to party leaders asking that the proposal not be taken to the plenary, citing the congressmen's focus on the elections.

After the inauguration of United States President Donald Trump, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said he would count on the "support of the US government" to stop what he considered a "global trend" of censorship through the creation of laws and judicial decisions.

At the end of last year, Lowe, Lindsay and Sadeck sought out the rapporteur of the bill that regulates streaming, senator Eduardo Gomes (PL-TO), as revealed by Jota. The vote on the project was postponed.

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