House Republicans advance TikTok ban along party lines

House Republicans advanced a bill Wednesday that would give President Biden the ability to ban TikTok after a contentious Tuesday meeting, where Democrats slammed the GOP over accusations of trying to rush through text that opponents said is flawed. 

The House Foreign Affairs Committee voted 24-16 in a party-line vote Wednesday morning to advance Committee Chair Michael McCaul’s (R-Texas) Deterring America’s Technology Adversaries Act (DATA Act).

The bill now heads to the House floor, where it will need a majority of the chamber’s support to make it to the Senate.

The proposal was quietly introduced late last week and added to the schedule for a debate during Tuesday’s meeting. The vote was ultimately moved to Tuesday morning.

Democrats highlighted that the committee did not hold hearings on the bill ahead of Tuesday’s committee vote. 

“We should not be making judgements based upon fear, based upon speculation. Especially when we have a process in place with the [Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States] to determine what the facts are,” ranking member Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.) said, referring to the CFIUS review Biden ordered of TikTok in June 2021. 

“This is far too serious for us to make a decision by fear and to be wrong,” he added.

Democrats accuse GOP of rushing TikTok ban proposal

Meeks said he “forcefully and unequivocally” opposed the legislation, which he said would damage allegiances across the globe, destroy jobs in the U.S. and “undercut core American values of free speech and free enterprise.”

The DATA Act would amend an existing exemption under something called the Berman Amendments, which limit the president from regulating informational materials to promote the exchange of ideas across nations, so that it does not apply to “sensitive personal data.”

The change would allow the president to potentially ban software applications, such as TikTok, which is owned by Chinese-based ByteDance. 

McCaul called TikTok a “modern day Trojan Horse” for the Chinese Communist Party to “surveil and exploit” American’s personal data. He said his bill would give the administration power to sanction TikTok and other applications that “threaten” U.S. national security. 

TikTok has pushed back against allegations that it poses a national security threat.

“A U.S. ban on TikTok is a ban on the export of American culture and values to the billion-plus people who use our service worldwide. We’re disappointed to see this rushed piece of legislation move forward, despite its considerable negative impact on the free speech rights of millions of Americans who use and love TikTok,” said TikTok spokesperson Brooke Oberwetter in a Wednesday statement.

Critics say bill could ‘decimate’ U.S. companies, impact free speech

Rep. David Cicilline (D-R.I.) said what is “most disappointing” about Tuesday’s markup is there is “broad universal support” to do what the bill aims to do, but that the bill presented to the committee for a vote is “not well written” and lacks definitions on key portions of the text. 

Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-Calif.) said the “hastily drafted” bill could “decimate” U.S. companies and has concerning implications for Americans’ right to freedom of expression. 

“To me this bill is clear evidence of an attempt to use the hot button issue to jump into the spotlight with no regard for the actual policy impacts,” she said. 

McCaul and Rep. Ann Wagner (R-Mo.) pushed back on Democrats’ accusations that the bill was rushed or that the committee should delay action. 

McCaul said his office was in conversations with the monitor “for a month” about the language of the bill. The committee chair said “we can’t wait until CFIUS reaches an agreement.” 

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) also urged Congress not to pass the proposal, arguing it would violate the First Amendment rights of the millions of Americans who use the app to “communicate and express themselves daily.”

Growing anti-TikTok pressure builds

The debate over McCaul’s proposal is the latest sign of the mounting anti-TikTok sentiment in Congress. Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.) and Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) introduced a separate proposal to ban TikTok in the U.S. earlier this year. 

A push to ban TiKTok on government devices successfully made its way into a government spending bill last year, and was signed into law by Biden. Proposals to ban TikTok nationwide, though, face a tougher battle. 

Even Democrats who voted against McCaul’s proposal on Tuesday expressed interest in pursuing some form of action, but in a way that addresses concerns they said are raised about how the bill impacts freedom of speech. 

In the Senate, Democrats have also expressed support for adding limitations on how TikTok operates, but have stopped short of backing an outright ban. 

For example, Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) has asked the executive officers of Apple and Google to remove TikTok from their app stores.

Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Mark Warner (D-Va.) is planning to introduce a proposal that would establish a comprehensive and risk-based process to review foreign-owned technology services.