WASHINGTON — The House of Representatives is poised to pass a bill Wednesday to ban TikTok in the United States, as Republicans and Democrats alike warn that the popular video-sharing app is a national security threat.
TikTok, owned by China-based parent company ByteDance, said the bill would violate the First Amendment rights of its 170 million U.S. users and harm thousands of small businesses that depend on it. We are actively lobbying to have the bill repealed.
“You're going to destroy small businesses like ours. This is our livelihood. We created our success,” said the man, who runs a skin care company called Love and Pebble with his wife. Paul Tran spoke at a pro-TikTok rally in the suburbs. Capitol on Tuesday.
He said business was mostly shut down last year until TikTok Shop came along and “our business completely exploded.” Currently, he said, 90% of his business comes from the app.
“If we pass this bill, we will destroy the American dream that we so deeply believe in,” Tran said.
Despite the moves, the bipartisan bill is expected to pass the House and move on to the Senate, although lawmakers say they are still considering the bill. President Joe Biden said he would sign the bill into law once it reaches his desk.
Supporters say it would be a mistake to call the bill an outright ban. The bill, called the Protecting Americans from Applications Controlled by Foreign Enemies Act, would allow the president, through the FBI and intelligence agencies, to protect certain social media applications that are under the control of foreign adversaries, such as China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. It creates a process for specifying. , as a national security threat.
If an app is deemed risky, it will be banned from online app stores and web hosting services unless it disassociates itself from entities controlled by foreign adversaries within 180 days of designation. This means TikTok, which FBI Director Christopher Wray has testified poses a risk to national security, could face a ban if ByteDance doesn't act quickly to sell it.
“What we are seeking is to separate TikTok from its parent company, ByteDance, and by extension from the Chinese Communist Party,” said House of Representatives Mike Gallagher, the bill's author and chairman of the special committee investigating the Chinese Communist Party. said Rep. (R-Wis.). On Tuesday, he walked out of a secret House-wide briefing on the dangers of TikTok. “And in that world, TikTok users can continue to use the platform. In fact, I think it would improve the user experience.”
U.S. lawmakers and intelligence officials say the Chinese government used TikTok to access the personal data of millions of users and used algorithms to display videos that could influence users' opinions. There are concerns that this could happen, and this includes the upcoming presidential election. In testimony before Congress a year ago, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew denied that the Chinese government controlled the app and said China had access to U.S. user data. He refuted that observation.
In crafting the bill, Gallagher worked with Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi of Illinois, the top Democrat on the China Committee, and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Ill.), who has been an outspoken critic of China's human rights abuses throughout her long career. (California) was consulted.
“What concerns me is what TikTok is doing in Taiwan, claiming that the Uyghurs love their genocide and the people of Hong Kong love their voter suppression,” Pelosi told reporters. That's what happened.''
But she added: “We want TikTok to exist. We're not here to ban it. We want it to be Tik-Tok-Toe. We want it to be something, but not a horrible social media platform.'' This is a very positive thing. And to do that, we need to strip the data from the Chinese government that stores it. …Whoever controls the algorithm controls everything. …It's “a national security issue, but also a personal security issue.”
The multibillion-dollar social media giant's presence was all over the Capitol ahead of the House vote. TikTok users were shown a pop-up on the app asking them to call their local representative, as well as a push notification that said, “Help us stop TikTok from shutting down.”
Outside the Capitol, several young House Democrats, including Robert Garcia and Sarah Jacobs of California, Maxwell Frost of Florida, and Delia Ramirez of Illinois, rallied with TikTok creators. , expressed opposition to the bill.
Mr. Frost, 27, insisted he was “absolutely opposed” to the bill and predicted that opposition would have been stronger had the vote been delayed a week.
One of the creators, JT Rayborn, said he was “sick and tired” of hearing lawmakers ridicule TikTok and its creators because millions of small businesses depend on it. Told.
“My voice is on TikTok. My purpose is on TikTok. That's it. I can't let this happen,” Rayborn said.
