Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., defended the House bill to ban TikTok from American app stores and web-hosting services unless it divests from its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, as "a unique, targeted approach to address a national security threat."
Former President Donald Trump on Monday released a statement calling for Congress not to ban TikTok, saying it would empower rival social media platform Facebook and its parent company, Meta, despite Trump previously leading the charge to ban TikTok while he was in office.
Rodgers, who chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee, said on Newsmax's "National Report" on Tuesday that legislators looking to force TikTok to split from its owner are "building upon what President Trump attempted to do when he was in office."
Rodgers also claimed that TikTok is "unique from Facebook and Meta and other Big Tech companies. This is a unique targeted approach to address a national security threat that … apps Like TikTok, controlled by foreign adversaries, like China, pose to the American people."
Rodgers added: "TikTok has repeatedly been caught in the lie that is not beholden to the Chinese Communist Party because of its ownership by ByteDance. Yet we know from internal recordings of employees that they have said everything is seen by China, and we're talking about 177 million American users' data, their data being used to target, to surveil, to manipulate our nation.
Rodgers said, "It is very important that we take action," and noted that the panel she chairs "passed this bill with a unanimous vote, 50 to 0, which underscores the belief among the members that it is very important that we take this targeted approach to address national security concerns posed by TikTok and other apps that are controlled by foreign adversaries."
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Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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