Lawmakers’ long-held concerns about the growing reach of China’s technology platforms and its ability to influence Americans culminated in a bill overwhelmingly supported in the House that would require the divestiture of TikTok.
The bill’s next step is the Senate, though, where the attitude was summed up Wednesday by Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer, who greeted the House passage by saying, “The Senate will review the legislation when it comes over from the House,” offering no indication of a timetable.
Some senators may be equally alarmed about the rise of China’s technology platforms, but the chamber clearly doesn’t have the House’s fervor, which took the bill from introduction to passage by a 352-65 vote within a week.
House members of both parties — including Reps. Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., and Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., who lead the House select China committee and introduced the legislation — urged senators to act quickly in passing companion legislation, as did former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.
The measure would require TikTok’s Chinese owner ByteDance to divest its U.S. subsidiary within six months of the law taking effect. The bill also would give the president the authority to deny other social media apps owned and operated by foreign adversaries access to U.S. users unless they sever ties to their foreign owners.
Sens. Mark Warner, D-Va., and Marco Rubio, R-Fla., top lawmakers on the Senate Intelligence Committee with access to intelligence information on China’s potential to use TikTok to influence the thinking of its 170 million American users, welcomed the House measure.
“We are united in our concern about the national security threat posed by TikTok — a platform with enormous power to influence and divide Americans whose parent company ByteDance remains legally required to do the bidding of the Chinese Communist Party,” Warner and Rubio said in a statement. “We were…
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