House votes to ban TikTok or force sale, despite First Amendment concerns – National & International News – WED 13Mar2024

The House passed a bill to either force the sale of Chinese-owned TikTok or ban it in the US, citing concerns over cyber security and election interference. Opponents of the bill see the US government crusade against TikTok as a “moral panic” and an attack on the freedom of expression of millions of Americans.

House votes overwhelmingly in favor of bill to ban TikTok or force sale

Today, the House voted 352-65 in support of The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act (PAFACA). The bill would force Chinese parent company ByteDance to either sell TikTok, a video-sharing platform with over 170 million users in the US, or see it removed from app stores. The bill has been advanced under the guise of protecting Americans’ data from a Chinese-owned company, as well as concerns about online election interference from foreign entities.

President Biden has said he would sign the bill if it arrived on his desk. Some prominent voices in the Senate are also calling for a swift vote on the legislation, but Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), has not yet committed to bringing it to the floor. Government workers at both the federal level and in several states are already banned from using TikTok over fears the Chinese government could use the app to spy on them.

A moral panic

However, the bill has many detractors. Some have called US politicians’ fear-mongering over TikTok a moral panic that does nothing to address broader legitimate concerns about social media apps and other tech companies collecting and selling users’ data. Online security experts say the attention on TikTok and efforts to ban it only serve to distract from security issues posed other tech giants.

The PAFACA would not prevent any potential American buyer of TikTok from also engaging in predatory data-sharing practices. When former President Trump first attempted to force TikTok’s sale in 2020, one of the leading contenders to buy the company was US tech giant Microsoft. Other potential contenders are Apple, Amazon, Meta (Facebook’s parent company) or Google. 

In 2022, Rep. Frank Pallone, Jr., (D-NJ) proposed legislation that would address threats to data privacy posed by social media companies like Facebook and Twitter, and as well as Microsoft and Google, which have dominated the online experience for over two decades. Despite all these companies coming under fire for their data-sharing practices in recent years, Pallone’s legislation has never come up for a vote.

Proponents of the bill have said the root of the concern is that TikTok is Chinese-owned. However, there is no talk of banning Temu, the second most downloaded shopping app in the US after Amazon, which is also Chinese-owned.

Freedom of expression

For years, US politicians and Western proponents of free expression have slammed China’s ban on social media sites like Twitter and Facebook as authoritarian and censorious. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) sees PAFACA as a similar state-sponsored attack on the free speech rights of millions of Americans. 

TikTok, like every other social media app, is vulnerable to misinformation campaigns and other harmful content. However, it has also become an important platform for raising awareness about a wide variety of social and political issues, particularly among young people. Millions of Americans also use TikTok to promote their businesses and earn an income.

There are vocal opponents of the PAFACA in Congress, among both Democrats and Republicans. “The problem is the process here, the fact that it’s been steamrolled and people really can’t digest the consequences,” Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-FL) said. “I would like to see TikTok ownership changed, but not at the expense of our First Amendment rights, business owners and content creators.”

Rep. Rand Paul (R-KY) has called the PFACA a “draconian measure that stifles free expression, tramples constitutional rights, and disrupts the economic pursuits of millions of Americans”. Even former President Donald Trump, who previously attempted to shut down TikTok in the US, recently flipped against the idea. In an interview earlier this week, Trump said that shutting down TikTok would only empower social media giants like Meta, which he called “an enemy of the people”.