The bipartisan plot to save TikTok

Is banning TikTok “racist” and “totalitarian”? Only if you ask fringe voices on the Left and Right. Though these voices are less about principles than politics, they are growing louder and jeopardizing Washington’s best chance yet to target Beijing’s Trojan Horse app.

Days before TikTok CEO Shou Chew testified before Congress, Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) decried Washington’s scrutiny as “xenophobic.” His colleague Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) called it a “witch hunt.” Days after the hearing, CNN ran a story suggesting that banning TikTok would make Asian-Americans more vulnerable to hate crimes. One of their sources was the chairman of the Committee on 100, an organization with reported links to the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) United Front influence operations.

To their credit, some members of the Biden administration have been more honest about their reservations. Look no further than the Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo: “The politician in me thinks you’re gonna literally lose every voter under 35, forever.” Her candor was outmatched only by her authority. The piece of legislation the Biden administration has endorsed, the “RESTRICT Act,” would leave a TikTok ban up to the Commerce Secretary’s discretion. That’s a risky gamble, particularly in light of pleading from Democratic political operatives to keep the app online through the 2024 election.

Even so, Raimondo at least recognizes TikTok as a security threat. Others, like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) have parroted TikTok talking points about “data privacy” and equate the app to other platforms like Facebook and Twitter. But TikTok isn’t just about privacy; it’s about disinformation. Thanks to the app, Beijing has a highway to the phones of 150 million Americans, many of whom spend over five hours a day on TikTok. It’s a dream scenario for the CCP. What better way to divide Americans and spread false narratives and outright lies than on a popular app with addictive tendencies?

Unfortunately, political opposition to banning TikTok isn’t confined to just one side of the political aisle. In a recent monologue, Fox News pundit Tucker Carlson criticized the “RESTRICT Act” as “part of a strategy to make America much more like China, with the government in charge of what you read and see and with terrifying punitive power at their fingertips.” What Tucker failed to mention was the legislation’s origin. It’s based on a 2019 Trump administration Executive Order that instructed the Department of Commerce to address problematic technological threats from bad actors like China under existing law. Tucker was noticeably quiet four years ago when a Republican White House advanced the exact same policy.

Unfortunately, grandstanding appears to be the preferred approach to the issue. Consider recent comments from Donald Trump, Jr., in which he accused Republicans and Democrats of exploiting a TikTok ban “to control what we do and see.” This suspicion dovetails with similar concerns that the “RESTRICT Act” is the reincarnation of the Patriot Act, and leaves private Americans exposed to government surveillance. These concerns are divorced from the actual text of the bill. Section 5, which some libertarians misread as an invitation to espionage, is nothing of the sort. It’s connected to blocking and divestment provisions that would target problematic apps like TikTok, not individual Americans.

Granted, it’s easy to misread complex legislation. But it should also be easy to avoid repeating Chinese Communist Party (CCP) talking points.

However, Republicans are also falling into this trap. On March 29, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) announced his opposition to banning TikTok, even in a narrowly-scoped approach. His stated reason? “TikTok is cooperating through Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. to make sure all data on Americans is protected from any Chinese government snooping.” Except that they aren’t. CFIUS, the interagency group Sen. Paul references, apparently rejected TikTok’s assurances weeks ago. Of course, TikTok’s CEO, Shou Chew, has continued peddling this talking point to muddy the waters. But why accept TikTok’s fig leaf excuses when American public servants have reportedly rejected them?

Based on Paul’s own remarks, the answer becomes clear: Like AOC, he doesn’t see TikTok as a security threat. In remarks on the Senate floor, he dismissed the app as “a few dance videos.” Noticeably absent from his remarks were any mention of TikTok’s banning of Americans for criticizing the CCP, the surveillance of U.S. journalists by its parent company, ByteDance, or the app’s censorship of content about the genocide against China’s Uighur Muslim minority.

All these protestations raise the troubling possibility that America’s leaders lack the political will to roll back Beijing’s malign influence inside our own borders.

Banning TikTok doesn’t make America like the CCP; it preserves our body politic and protects us from Beijing’s predations. The United States cannot counter China around the world if we leave ourselves vulnerable and exposed at home. If we want to keep our country strong, we need to ban TikTok — now.

Michael Sobolik is fellow in Indo-Pacific studies at the American Foreign Policy Council in Washington. Follow him on Twitter @michaelsobolik.