UPDATE: President Joe Biden (D) signed HR 815 — the Legislature’s foreign aid package that includes the potential ban on TikTok — into law on Wednesday, April 24.
Federal lawmakers finalized legislation Tuesday that could potentially lead to a nationwide ban on the social media platform TikTok by next year.
Under the measure approved by a bipartisan vote of 79-18 in the Senate, TikTok would be banned from all US app stores unless ByteDance — the platform’s Chinese-owned parent company — sells the social media site within about nine months.
The president would have the authority to issue a one-time ninety-day extension of this deadline to ByteDance if by that time a plan for divestment has been identified, significant progress toward executing that plan has been made, and binding legal agreements are in place to enable the separation to be completed before the extension expires.
This bill was passed as part of a broad package of legislation — HR 815 — that included provisions to send aid to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan, as well as a handful of other measures related to foreign affairs.
Click Here for More Information on HR 815
President Joe Biden (D) said in a statement Tuesday that he will sign HR 815 when it reaches his desk and praised lawmakers in the Senate for finalizing the bill. His brief statement, however, focused solely on the aspects of the legislation pertaining to foreign aid and did not explicitly address the potential TikTok ban.
Click Here to Read President Biden’s Full Statement
According to an internal memo obtained by the Associated Press, TikTok is expected to file a lawsuit against the government as soon as the bill is signed into law.
Because the company will likely pursue a preliminary injunction to halt enforcement, it is possible that there will be a lengthy delay before the platform would need to comply with these requirements, if at all.
Division H of HR 815 — the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act — originated as a standalone House bill in March where it was quickly approved by a strong bipartisan majority in a vote of 352-65.
The measure stalled in the Senate, however, before being added into the omnibus foreign aid package.
[RELATED: Potential TikTok Ban Passes U.S. House of Reps with Strong Bipartisan Support]
TikTok has been subject to heightened scrutiny in recent months over data privacy concerns, as Chinese law requires the country’s businesses to share information with the government upon request.
Despite this law, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew has denied ever having shared U.S. users’ data with the Chinese government, stating before Congress that the company has begun taking steps to ensure that American data continues to remain shielded from Chinese officials, citing what has become known as “Project Texas.”
The $1.5 billion plan primarily entails transferring the data of US TikTok users to the cloud infrastructure of Oracle — a cloud company based in Austin, Texas — as well as restructuring their US operations to provide a greater level of transparency and oversight in an effort to increase American confidence in the platform’s security.
Regardless of this, both the federal government and a number of states have taken action to ban the download or use of TikTok on government-owned devices due to security concerns.
As of January 2023, 33 states — including Maine — had put in place some form of a ban on TikTok for government-issued devices.
Although the recently-approved law is frequently referred to as a ban on TikTok, lawmakers have pushed back on this interpretation.
“Every national security official in the Biden administration has warned about the national security threat posed by TikTok under its current ownership structure,” said Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-WI) to CBS News. “That’s what we’re trying to get at. Not a ban, but a separation.”
Some have raised concerns that this bill violates the First Amendment rights of American users who wish to post and interact with content on the platform.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has suggested that this legislation is an attempt “to trade our First Amendment rights for cheap political points during an election year.”
“Just because the bill sponsors claim that banning TikTok isn’t about suppressing speech, there’s no denying that it would do just that. We strongly urge legislators to vote no on this unconstitutional bill,” the ACLU said in a March statement.
Around this same time, the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University issued a similar statement, urging lawmakers to “use tools that impose less of a burden on First Amendment rights” in their effort to protect Americans’ data.
Earlier this year, President Joe Biden’s (D) reelection campaign joined TikTok in spite of the oft-cited security concerns surrounding the platform.
[RELATED: Biden Campaign Joins TikTok Despite Persistent Security Concerns]
President Biden had previously utilized TikTok influencers in an effort to connect with younger audiences on the platform, but until then, had refrained from setting up an account for himself or his campaign.
Former President Donald Trump (R) has spoken out in opposition to the potential ban on TikTok despite having championed a similar move while in office, arguing that a ban on the platform would give a boost to Facebook and other Meta platforms.
“If you get rid of TikTok, Facebook and Zuckerschmuck will double their business,” former President Trump wrote on Truth Social in March. “I don’t want Facebook, who cheated in the last Election, doing better. They are a true Enemy of the People!”
Should the recently-passed law withstand legal challenges and ByteDance fail to sell TikTok within the allotted time frame, the app would disappear from app stores across the country but would not immediately cease to exist in the United States
Users who had already downloaded the app to their phones would be able to continue using the site, but updates would no longer be available and new users would be largely unable to download the TikTok while in the country.
Biden needs TikTok to communicate with his sperm-slurping pervert supporters.
America is controlled by evil Zionist’s.
But joe is still buyng adds on it.