”It was very quick”: House Dems sound alarm about the TikTok bill’s speedy passage
Meanwhile, supporters of the legislation say the bill isn’t an outright ban but a demand for full divestiture—a distinction most laypeople will misunderstand or ignore.
Just eight days ago, the top two leaders of the House Select Committee on China introduced a bill that would remove TikTok from US app stories if its owner—Chinese internet technology company ByteDance—refused to fully divest of the app within 180 days.
Two days later, the Energy & Commerce Committee, the panel with jurisdiction over the issue, advanced the bill in a unanimous 50–0 vote, which I described on Monday as a “demonstration rarely seen in Congress these days.”
Fast-forward to this morning: Nearly 200 Republicans joined 155 Democrats to pass the bill, despite the opposition of TikTok’s broad creator community and human rights groups like the ACLU.
In a Congress that has yet to fully fund the government nearly six months into the fiscal year, approve President Joe Biden’s request for billions in emergency national security funding or reauthorize the farm bill, federal aviation programs and US spy powers beyond short-term extensions, the rate at which the lower chamber accelerated the TikTok bill was striking.
“I’m a freshman. I only have one year to go by, but I’ve rarely seen something move so far with so little debate,” Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), one of the most vocal critics of the legislation, said. “[I wasn’t] involved in the process of the bill but it’s been incredibly fast. And that’s something I’ve heard from senior Democrats and senior people in our caucus as well, so that’s just really concerning.”
Another first-term member expressed a similar sentiment.
“It was absolutely very quick—in less than four days,” Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-Ill.), one of the 65 members who voted against the bill, told me heading onto the House floor. “You have people right now protesting and saying, ‘How come there wasn’t really actual hearings around this?’ And when people have enough time to read the bill, they’re also like, ‘Oh no, this is not actually what you say it is.’”
I asked House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), who moments before the vote issued a statement in support of the bill, if he agreed with his members’ gripe that the process was hastened.
“As I indicated in my statement, there are very principled objections and concerns raised by members with respect to timing and process and I have no disagreement with them.”
The legislation was brought to the floor under suspension of the rules, a process that allowed House Republican leadership to prevent the bill from stalling in regular order. Suspension votes require a two-thirds majority vote to pass, limit debate to 40 minutes and prohibit amendments. Speaking of debate, prominent China hawk and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) invoked a popular game this morning as she argued in favor of the bill in a now-viral moment.
Supporters of the bill reiterated at every turn that it isn’t an outright ban but a demand for full divestiture, a distinction most laypeople will misunderstand or ignore.
“What we’re asking is that they divest and I think that’s a win-win,” Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-N.Y.), a member of the E&C Committee, told me yesterday. “Because we know that there are so many around the world, but in the US in particular, who have used this tool to enhance their work, share their moments with folks and I think the security issues are really paramount. We don’t want the American people to wake up one day and say, ‘Why didn’t our members protect us?’”
After the vote, Rep. Gabe Amo (D-R.I.) told me that the bill is consistent with all the work Congress has done to fortify the US economy against China.
“There is an alternative here,” he said. “But it’s critically important that our data and the national security of Americans is protected at all costs.”
Ramirez said although the bill is intended to protect Americans’ information, it will fall short in practice.
“It’s going to, in essence, ban TikTok. And it’s a major violation of freedom of speech,” she told me. “And so I think more and more folks are hearing that today and it’ll be interesting to see the vote.”
Despite the strong bipartisan vote, the bill was opposed by several top Democrats, including the number-two and -five members—Whip Katherine Clark (Mass.) and Assistant Leader Jim Clyburn (S.C.)—and Rep. Jim Himes (Conn.), the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee.
“We trust our citizens to be worthy of their democracy. We do not trust our government to decide what information they may or may not see,” Himes said in a statement. “I suspect that there is a way to address the challenge posed by TikTok that is consistent with our commitment to freedom of expression. But a bill quickly passed by one committee less than a week ago is not that way.”
Seven other committee ranking members voted no as well: New York Reps. Greg Meeks (Foreign Affairs), Jerry Nadler (Judiciary) and Nydia Velázquez (Small Business); Massachusetts Reps. Richie Neal (Ways & Means) and Jim McGovern (Rules); Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California (Science) and Rep. Brendan Boyle (Budget).
Clark told me on Tuesday afternoon that House Democratic leadership did not officially whip the vote, which is common for suspension bills. This enabled members to vote according to their values and districts.
Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas) was the only member to vote present on the bill.
When reached for comment, Crockett said through a spokesperson that while she agreed with the spirit of the bill, she had grave concerns about the constitutionality of it as written.
“I appreciate the heart of this bill and the real national security and privacy concerns it seeks to address, and for those reasons, I did not vote against it,” she said. “However, I do not believe this legislation is the correct vehicle to address the pressing dangers posed by other social media companies with demonstrated negative impacts on our democracy and information sphere, both in national elections and during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
TikTok has been in Congress’s crosshairs for a while now.
Last year, I watched TikTok CEO Shou Chew testify before the Energy & Commerce Committee for more than four hours. Members from both sides of the aisle expressed deep frustration with the executive for what they characterized as evasiveness that betrayed his repeated promises of transparency to the committee.
At the time, Chew defended TikTok by pointing to its popularity among the then-150 million Americans who use the app and then-five million small businesses that generate revenue from the app. He also made the case for Project Texas, the app’s initiative to safeguard US data and national security interests, which felt like an unpersuasive argument then and even more so now. TikTok has added 20 million American users and two million business owners to the app since his E&C testimony.
In January, Chew testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee in a hearing on child sex abuse material with four other Big Tech CEOs. During his testimony, he emphasized TikTok’s commitment to user data security and said that since the app’s global headquarters are in Los Angeles. (TikTok is also headquartered in Singapore, with offices in New York, London, Dublin, Paris Berlin, Dubai, Jakarta, Seoul and Tokyo.)
The executive acknowledged that while ByteDance is headquartered in Beijing, the majority of its investors are based around the world. The rest are owned by the company’s founding team and employees. The company has a five-team Board of Directors with three Americans on it.
Chew was on Capitol Hill this week lobbying senators to oppose the bill and a group of protesters demonstrated against it this morning ahead of the vote. But in recent days, the company drew the ire of lawmakers with aggressive pop-up calls-to-action urging users to call both House E&C members and their representatives and encourage them to vote against the bill.
We’re in an election year, so it’s impossible to disregard the electoral implications of the bill.
“Not only do I think this is terrible policy, I think it’s terrible politics,” Garcia, who joined TikTok before he was elected to Congress, said. “Separate to the fact that we should vote this down based on the bill, you have a disruption in a service like TikTok before an election. I think it’ll be incredibly disruptive to people the way they gather information. And more and more importantly, who are they going to blame for the app not being [available] to them?”
Several members I spoke to this week mentioned concerns of a backlash from young voters if TikTok is ultimately banned. But Jeffries was less worried.
“I don’t support a TikTok ban,” he said. And I have every confidence in the world that whatever the course of this legislation takes as it goes over to the Senate that TikTok will remain available to those who continue to enjoy the platform at the very moment.”
Amo had words of reassurance as well.
“I think it’s important that people who use the platform, young people, know that we want them to continue to enjoy it, but just under ownership that does not put us at threat of Americans’ data being used for nefarious purposes.”
Meanwhile, Clarke of New York told me that creators were top of mind as she weighed the merits of the bill.
“There’s a lot of appropriation that takes place and we don’t have the reach, if you will, that we should globally to protect our folks,” Clarke told me. “This is the one action we can take that can help us.”
President Biden told reporters he would sign the bill into law if Congress passes it.
FBI, Justice Department and national intelligence officials were dispatched to Capitol Hill on Tuesday to provide members with a classified briefing on the TikTok and national security to fortify support.
But the briefing may have harmed its cause more than helped.
Ramirez told me members left the security briefing expressing opposition to the bill instead of support.
“That tells you a lot,” she said.
Garcia added: “We have yet to receive one piece of public evidence that actually shows that somehow China is actually negatively using our data—that has not been proven.”
For what it’s worth: I ran into a House Democrat in the hall near the House chamber after the briefing with so much angst in their face I thought they were experiencing a personal crisis. Turns out, they came out of the session more uncertain than when they entered. (This member voted no.)
The fate of the bill faces an uncertain future in the Senate.
And while many senators have expressed reservations with the House version of the bill and indicated that they’d want to tweak it at best, the top two members of the Senate Intelligence Committee said they would advocate for the pending legislation.
“We are united in our concern about the national security threat posed by TikTok,” Chair Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Vice Chair Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said in a statement. “We were encouraged by today’s strong bipartisan vote in the House of Representatives and look forward to working together to get this passed through the Senate and signed into law.” (Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) was less committal: “The Senate will review the legislation when it comes over from the House.”)
For better or worse, the Senate is known to move much slower than the House—a characteristic bill opponents like Garcia hope plays to their advantage.
So I hope the Senate considers this a little bit more,” he said. “This is a huge mistake and we're going to work with the Senate. I think the Senate, hopefully, will be a little bit more responsible than we've been in addressing the concerns.”