U.S. House panel unanimously approves TikTok crackdown bill
Global News
The U.S. House Energy and Commerce committee on Thursday unanimously approved legislation giving China's ByteDance six months to divest from TikTok or face a U.S. ban.
The U.S. House Energy and Commerce committee on Thursday unanimously approved legislation giving China’s ByteDance six months to divest from short video app TikTok or face a U.S. ban.
The 50-0 vote represents the most significant momentum for a U.S. crackdown on TikTok, which has about 170 million U.S. users, which had stalled over the last year amid heavy lobbying by the company.
Lawmakers hope to move quickly on the measure and said the U.S. House of Representatives could take up the bill in the coming weeks.
“This legislation has a predetermined outcome: a total ban of TikTok in the United States,” the company said after the vote. “The government is attempting to strip 170 million Americans of their Constitutional right to free expression. This will damage millions of businesses, deny artists an audience, and destroy the livelihoods of countless creators across the country.”
Before the vote, lawmakers got a closed-door classified briefing on national security concerns about TikTok’s Chinese ownership.
Representative Frank Pallone, the top Democrat on the committee, on Thursday said his hope was the law “will force divestment of TikTok and Americans will be able to continue to use this and other similarly situated platforms without the risk that they are being operated and controlled by our adversaries.”
Representative Mike Gallagher, the Republican chairman of the House select China committee, and Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi, the panel’s top Democrat, introduced legislation to address national security concerns posed by Chinese ownership of the app.
“TikTok could live on and people could do whatever they want on it provided there is that separation,” Gallagher said, urging U.S. ByteDance investors to support a sale. “It is not a ban – think of this as a surgery designed to remove the tumor and thereby save the patient in the process.”
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