The Senate voted yesterday, Tuesday (23/4), with a large majority in favor of a bill that demands that TikTok sever ties with its parent companythe Chinese company ByteDance, and more broadly with China in order not to risk being banned in the US.
The American president Joe Biden immediately said he would sign the bill, which was passed by the House of Representatives on Saturday and stems from concerns that China could access or monitor the data of Americans who use TikTok.
Related Article
“For years we have allowed the Chinese Communist Party to control one of the most popular apps in the US, and that has been dangerously short-sighted,” said Sen. Marco Rubio, the highest-ranking Republican on the Intelligence Committee.
“The new legislation will require the Chinese owner (of TikTok) to sell the app. It’s a good move for America,” he said.
The attitude of TikTok
TikTok, which emphasizes that has not shared and does not intend to share US user data of the Chinese government, complains that this bill amounts to a ban, which infringes on the freedom of expression of its users.
The company has not commented on the outcome of the Senate vote, but over the weekend announced to its workers that it would go to court to block the implementation of the legislation.
“We will continue to fight, as well this bill clearly violates the First Amendment rights of TikTok’s 170 million American users (…) This is the beginning and not the end of this long process,” the company told employees in an email seen by Reuters.
What does the bill provide?
The Senate voted 79 to 18 in favor of the measure, which was included in the bill that provided $95 billion in aid to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan.
In 2020 the then president of the USA Donald Trump tried to block TikTok in the country, but was blocked by justice.
The new bill has a stronger legal basis, according to experts, while giving the White House new tools to to prohibit or compel sale other foreign-owned applications that it believes threaten the country’s national security.
If enacted, the bill would force ByteDance to sell TikTok within 12 months.
Otherwise, according to APE-MPE, the application will be blocked from the online stores of Apple and Google in the US.
