Rep. Ro Khanna outlined his stance against a sweeping ban on social media platform TikTok on Sunday after opposing the bill that passed the House with a supermajority vote last week, with two senators expressing their openness to the bill.
“What actual evidence is there that you couldn’t have passed a data protection law or a law prohibiting the transfer of data abroad and dealt with it that way?” Khanna, a progressive Democrat from California, said on ABC’s “This Week.” “The frustration is that we have failed to pass these data privacy laws. These regulations would also cover data brokers who sell data to Chinese companies. This bill doesn’t really address this issue.”
Fifty Democrats – mostly from the party’s progressive wing – voted against the House bill, citing concerns that it could infringe on Americans’ right to free speech and harm small business owners who depend on TikTok for marketing and sales. The bill passed the House on Wednesday by a 352-65 vote.
The laws requires TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, to sell its US assets inside six months of signing the bill or face a complete ban within the United States. Supporters worry that the Chinese government will gain access to the information of some 150 million U.S. residents who use video apps and influence public debate in America by tweaking the app’s algorithms to its advantage.
Acknowledging the concerns of TikTok’s critics, Khanna said Sunday that security threats from the Chinese government may very well be higher addressed with a “narrowly tailored law” that prohibits any transfer of Americans’ private data to China and other foreign entities.
The United States doesn’t have a federal data privacy law that will restrict the sale of non-public information, potentially allowing foreign entities to buy the private information of thousands and thousands of Americans. Mr. Khanna, whose congressional district includes Silicon Valley, has been making the vow for years recent law which places limits on technology corporations’ ability to collect and take advantage of user data.
While expressing sympathy for calls to ban TikTok, two of Khanna’s Senate colleagues – a Democrat and a Republican – didn’t express full support for the House bill on Sunday.
Sen. Ben Cardin, a Maryland Democrat and chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he’s open to supporting the House bill but has not yet made a final decision.
“We’ll see how the Senate wants to take it up,” Cardin said. “But I would like us to get to the finish line and provide the necessary guardrails.”
Senator Bill Cassidy, a Republican from Louisiana, partially shared Cardin’s position, while also emphasizing the necessity for quick motion against TikTok.
“I’d like to see the final language, but I’m certainly predisposed to vote for it,” Mr. Cassidy said. “Anyone who doesn’t think the Chinese Communist Party would like to influence the way of thinking in our country simply doesn’t understand what they are doing.”
