House Republicans are moving ahead with a bill that would require Chinese company ByteDance to sell TikTok or face a ban in the United States even as former president Donald Trump is voicing opposition to the effort.
House leadership has scheduled a vote on the measure for Wednesday. A Republican congressional aide not authorized to speak publicly said that鈥檚 still the plan and there has not been significant pushback to the bill from lawmakers.
A vote for the bill would represent an unusual break with the former president by House Republicans, but Speaker Mike Johnson and others have already forcefully come out in favor of the bill, and dropping it now would represent a significant reversal. 鈥淚t鈥檚 an important bipartisan measure to take on China, our largest geopolitical foe, which is actively undermining our economy and security,鈥 Johnson declared last week.
Trump said Monday that he still believes TikTok poses a national security risk but is opposed to banning the hugely popular app because doing so would help its rival, Facebook, which he continues to lambast over his 2020 election loss.
鈥淔rankly, there are a lot of people on TikTok that love it. There are a lot of young kids on TikTok who will go crazy without it,鈥 Trump said in a call-in interview with CNBC's 鈥淪quawk Box.鈥 鈥淭here鈥檚 a lot of good and there鈥檚 a lot of bad with TikTok. But the thing I don鈥檛 like is that without TikTok you鈥檙e going to make Facebook bigger, and I consider Facebook to be an enemy of the people, along with a lot of the media.鈥
鈥淲hen I look at it, I鈥檓 not looking to make Facebook double the size," he added. 鈥滻 think Facebook has been very bad for our country, especially when it comes to elections.鈥
Trump has repeatedly complained about Facebook's role during the 2020 election, which he still refuses to concede he lost to President Joe Biden. That includes at least US$400 million that its founder, Mark Zuckerberg, and his wife donated to two nonprofit organizations that distributed grants to state and local governments to help them conduct the 2020 election at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The donations 鈥 which were fully permitted under campaign finance law 鈥 went to pay for things like equipment to process mail ballots and drive-thru voting locations.
TikTok, a video-sharing app, has emerged as a major issue in the 2024 presidential campaign. The platform has about 170 million users in the U.S., most of whom skew younger 鈥 a demographic that both parties are desperately trying to court ahead of November's general election. Younger voters have become especially hard for campaigns to reach as they gravitate away from traditional platforms like cable television.
Biden's 2024 campaign officially joined TikTok last month, even though he has expressed his own national security concerns over the platform, banned it on federal devices and on Friday endorsed the legislation that could lead to its ban.
The bill being considered by the House would require the Chinese firm ByteDance to divest TikTok and other applications it owns within six months of the bill鈥檚 enactment in order to avoid a nationwide ban. The legislation also creates a process that lets the executive branch prohibit access to other apps that pose a threat to national security.
鈥淭his bill is an outright ban of TikTok, no matter how much the authors try to disguise it,鈥 TikTok said last week as a House committee took up the bill, passing it on a 50-0 vote. 鈥淭his legislation will trample the First Amendment rights of 170 million Americans and deprive 5 million small businesses of a platform they rely on to grow and create jobs.
Heritage Action, a conservative advocacy group, urged lawmakers to vote for the bill and said it would include the vote in its scorecard grading members.
鈥淭he legislation establishes an important national security standard for social media companies: Don't be controlled by a foreign adversary,鈥 the group said.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., a close Trump ally, said she's still studying the bill. Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., another ally, said he is worried the bill could unintentionally imperil other comparable businesses. He said he has not talked to the president on the matter.
Rep. Michael McCaul, the Republican chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, said he's still confident about prospects in the House.
鈥淚t's going to sail, and then it will be up to the Senate,鈥 McCaul said. 鈥淎nd the White House has already acknowledged that they're going to sign it into law. So I think this is a real positive step.鈥
As president, Trump attempted to ban TikTok through an executive order that called 鈥渢he spread in the United States of mobile applications developed and owned by companies in the People鈥檚 Republic of China (China)鈥 a threat to 鈥渢he national security, foreign policy and economy of the United States.鈥 The courts, however, blocked the action after TikTok sued, arguing such actions would violate free speech and due process rights.
Pressed on whether he still believed the app posed a national security risk, Trump said Monday: 鈥淚 do believe it. And we have to very much go into privacy and make sure that we are protecting the American people's privacy and data rights."
鈥淏ut," he went on to say, 鈥測ou have that problem with Facebook and lots of other companies, too." Some American companies, he charged, are 鈥漬ot so American. They deal in China. And if China wants anything from them they will give it. So that's a national security risk also."
Biden in 2022 banned the use of TikTok by the federal government鈥檚 nearly four million employees on devices owned by its agencies, with limited exceptions for law enforcement, national security and security research purposes.
He also recently signed an executive order that allows the Department of Justice and other federal agencies to take steps to prevent the large-scale transfer of Americans鈥 personal data to what the White House calls 鈥渃ountries of concern,鈥 including China.
Both the FBI and the Federal Communications Commission have warned that TikTok owner ByteDance could share user data 鈥 such as browsing history, location and biometric identifiers 鈥 with China鈥檚 authoritarian government. TikTok said it has never done that and wouldn鈥檛 do so if asked. The U.S. government also hasn鈥檛 provided evidence of that happening.
Trump had first voiced support for the app in a post on his Truth Social site last week. 鈥淚f you get rid of TikTok, Facebook and Zuckerschmuck will double their business. I don鈥檛 want Facebook, who cheated in the last Election, doing better," he wrote. "They are a true Enemy of the People!"
Trump, in the interview, said he had not discussed the company with Jeff Yass, a TikTok investor and a major GOP donor. Trump said the two had recently met 鈥渧ery briefly" but that Yass 鈥渘ever mentioned TikTok."
Trump also confirmed he met last week with Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of Tesla and SpaceX who has increasingly aligned himself with conservative politics. Trump said he didn't know whether Musk would end up supporting his campaign, noting they 鈥渙bviously have opposing views on a minor subject called electric cars," which Trump has railed against.
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