The project was approved with 352 votes in favor and 65 against.in a rare moment of agreement between Democrats and the Republican opposition in a politically divided Washington.
“Today’s bipartisan vote demonstrates Congress’s opposition to Communist China’s attempts to spy on and manipulate Americans, and marks our resolve in the face of enemies,” said Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson.
“I urge the Senate to approve the bill and send it to the president so that it becomes law,” he added.
The legislative initiative is so far the biggest threat facing the video-sharing application, which is very popular around the world, especially among young people.
However, its fate in the Senate is uncertain, as key figures oppose taking such a drastic measure.
Because it has a Chinese parent company, TikTok is a concern for the United States and other countries, They believe that the platform allows Beijing to spy on and manipulate some 170 million users in the United States.
President Joe Biden will promulgate the rule, officially known as “Protecting Americans from Solicitations Controlled by Foreign Rivals Act”once it is approved in both legislative chambers, the White House has already announced.
TikTok reacted by saying that the legislative process “was carried out in secret for a reason: it is a ban” and asked the Senate to “take into consideration the facts” and think about the economic impact the measure would have on 7 million small businesses and 170 million people who use that social network in the United States.
The law would require TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, to sell the app within 180 days to a local company. or else it will be excluded from the stores of the giants Apple and Google in the United States.
It would also give the president power to designate other apps as a national security threat if they are under the control of a country considered an adversary of the United States.
TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew is in Washington aiming to drum up support to stop the bill.
“This latest legislation, passed at unprecedented speed, without even the benefit of a public hearing, raises serious constitutional concerns,” Michael Beckerman, TikTok’s vice president of public policy, wrote in a letter to the bill’s cosponsors, to which the AFP.
No evidence
The promoters of the text, both from the House of Representatives, Republican Mike Gallagher and Democrat Raja Krishnamoorthi, as well as the White House, argue that the bill is not a ban on Tiktok, as long as the company disassociates itself from ByteDance .
Democrat Hakeem Jeffries, who voted in favor of the proposal, maintained that “it is not a ban,” but rather “aims to address legitimate national security and data protection issues.”
China warned Wednesday that the move would “inevitably turn against the United States.”
“Although the United States has never found evidence that TikTok threatens American national security, it has not stopped repressing it,” said Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin, denouncing “intimidating behavior.”
In a change from his previous stance, former President Donald Trump (2017-2021) said on Monday that he is against a ban on TikTok, mainly because it would strengthen the American group Meta, the owner of the social networks Instagram and Facebook , whom he called “enemies of the people.”
When Trump was president, he tried to wrest control of Tiktok from ByteDance, but was blocked by US courts.
Trump denied accusations that he changed his mind because an investor in TikTok, financier Jeff Yass, is a major donor to his campaign.
Other efforts to ban TikTok also failed: A bill proposed a year ago failed largely due to concerns that it constituted a threat to freedom of expression.
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