On Tuesday, The Washington Free Beacon posted an article about the banning of Tik-Tok. It is generally acknowledged that Tik-Tok is a Chinese Communist Party vehicle for gathering information on Americans, it is doubtful that it will be banned in America. Recently, the RESTRICT Act was introduced in Congress.
The article notes:
But the RESTRICT Act never names TikTok, which has signaled its support for the law, and instead empowers the Commerce Department to prohibit any technology that “poses undue or unacceptable risk to national security.” The bill prompted criticism from Republicans for failing to ban TikTok immediately. RESTRICT Act critics such as Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.), who has his own bill to outlaw TikTok, argue that the act could delay action against the tech company for years and relies on Biden administration officials who have voiced apprehensions about a ban, such as Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, to pull the trigger.
“There is no time for half-measures,” Rubio told the Washington Free Beacon.
Sen. J.D. Vance (R., Ohio), who supports a ban on TikTok, said last month that language in the RESTRICT Act is too broad. “You’re creating, effectively, a PATRIOT Act for the digital age,” Vance said.
The RESTRICT Act’s supporters have also botched its rollout, with cosponsor Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) showing in a late March interview with Fox News that he was unfamiliar with the bill’s provisions. According to a senior Senate Republican staffer, the botched rollout means that “anti-TikTok legislation is currently dead.” Another senior Senate aide, who worked on the RESTRICT Act, pushed back against that characterization, saying that no other bill “has this broad base of bipartisan support.”
The article notes one major reason Tik-Tok may not be banned:
Meanwhile, the White House is leaning into using TikTok and similar apps as it gears up for 2024, raising questions about whether it sincerely views the company as a national security threat. Biden’s campaign plans to “lean on hundreds of social media ‘influencers’ who will tout Biden’s record,” according to a recent report. As Chew (TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew) was testifying to Congress in March, the White House used an app owned by TikTok’s parent company to make an Instagram video.
The Biden administration is not going to ban one of the Democrat’s major weapons in the 2024 presidential campaign.