PARIS — French President Emanuel Macron said the European Union failed to leverage its massive single market and sufficiently scare the United States into accepting a better deal than the one it reached Sunday.

“We need to be feared. We weren’t feared enough,” Macron told ministers at the weekly cabinet meeting Wednesday, said a French official close to Macron, who was granted anonymity as it is often customary practice.

Macron was noticeably silent in the days after U.S. President Donald Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen struck the accord, which will see the EU pay 15 percent tariffs on most of its exports to the United States. 

The French leader did not strike as dire a tone as his prime minister, who said the pact marked a “dark day” for Europe. Macron even lauded European negotiators for protecting French and European interests during “negotiations conducted in difficult conditions” given Trump’s desire to implement some form of tariffs on U.S. trading partners — and with them, fundamentally transform the global economy.

But Macron said he believes there’s still time to alter the deal.

“The story isn’t over and we won’t stop there,” he said.

This developing story will be updated.