OAN Newsroom
UPDATED 5:40 PM PT – Tuesday, December 13, 2022
A group of Bipartisan lawmakers have unveiled legislation to ban the Chinese owned app TikTok in the United States.
On Tuesday, Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) announced the bill. The legislation would prohibit all transactions from social media companies with heavy ties to adversary countries including China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba and Venezuela. Lawmakers Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) and Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill) presented complementary bills in the U.S. House of Representatives.
“The federal government has yet to take a single meaningful action to protect American users from the threat of TikTok,” Rubio said. “There is no more time to waste on meaningless negotiations with a CCP-puppet company. It is time to ban Beijing-controlled TikTok for good.”
Many Americans are concerned at the possibility that the Chinese government may be obtaining user data from its American users. TikTok has previously stated that it does not share information with the Chinese Government and that a U.S. based security team chooses who can access U.S. user data coming from China.
Hilary McQuaid, a spokesperson for TikTok, spoke about the controversy.
“It’s troubling that rather than encouraging the administration to conclude its national security review of TikTok, some members of Congress have decided to push for a politically-motivated ban that will do nothing to advance the national security of the United States,” she said.
The Department of Homeland Security, the State Department, and the U.S. military have already blocked TikTok on equipment they control.