BRUSSELS — The European Union said on Thursday it was ready to deploy its strongest trade weapon against the U.S. after President Donald Trump threatened to impose sweeping tariffs and scorned the EU as having been created to “screw” America.

“We have an Anti-Coercion Instrument, and we will have to use it,” Agriculture Commissioner Christophe Hansen said in Paris after meeting with his French counterpart Annie Genevard at the Salon de l’Agriculture farming exhibition.