A bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers on Tuesday introduced a bill that would give China’s ByteDance about six months to sell its popular short video app TikTok or face a U.S. ban.
Rep. Mike Gallagher, the Republican chairman of the House China Select Committee, and Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, the top Democrat, joined dozens of other members of Congress to address the national security concerns posed by the app’s Chinese ownership. A close aide revealed that he is submitting the bill along with several others. .
“Apps like TikTok that are controlled by foreign adversaries pose an unacceptable risk to the national security of the United States,” the lawmakers said in a fact sheet.
TikTok did not immediately comment.
The bill would give ByteDance 165 days to sell TikTok, which is used by more than 170 million Americans, or app stores run by companies like Apple and Google would offer it. It would be illegal to provide web hosting services to ByteDance-managed applications. .
The bill would not allow enforcement against individual users of affected apps.
A Senate bill to ban the popular app stalled in Congress last year in the face of intense lobbying from TikTok.
The bill would be the first major legislative effort in nearly a year to ban or force ByteDance to sell its apps.
The bill, which requires a companion bill in the Senate and will be considered for a vote Thursday at a hearing in the Energy and Commerce Committee, poses a significant threat to ByteDance’s ownership of TikTok. there is a possibility.
Still, the app is so popular that it could be difficult to get the bill approved in an election year.
Last month, President Biden’s re-election campaign joined TikTok.
The bill would give the president new powers to designate apps of concern that pose a national security risk and face bans and restrictions unless they are sold.
This applies to apps that “have more than 1 million annual active users and are under the control of a hostile foreign entity.”
Concerns about Chinese-owned TikTok prompted moves in Congress last year to strengthen its powers to address the popular short video-sharing app or potentially ban it.
The White House did not immediately comment on the new bill, but it backed a bill introduced by Sen. Mark Warner and more than 20 other senators last year, saying it would protect TikTok and other foreign companies if they threaten national security. It provides the administration with new powers to ban based technology. threat.
The bill has never been voted on.
According to reports from Reuters and other sources, in March 2023, the U.S. Treasury Department-led Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States demanded that TikTok’s Chinese owners sell their shares or risk being banned from the app. However, the government has not taken any action.
The new bill aims to strengthen legal powers to address TikTok’s concerns.
Biden’s predecessor, Republican Donald Trump, tried to ban TikTok in 2020 but was blocked by a U.S. court.
Aides said the bill would not apply to non-social media apps in China, such as those run by retailers Shein and Temu.
