TikTok might get banned. For real this time.
Post Reports
The Washington Post
4.4 • 5.1K Ratings
🗓️ 23 April 2024
⏱️ 24 minutes
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Summary
The Senate is expected to pass a bipartisan bill that would force TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, to sell the platform or face a national ban. How did Congress finally achieve consensus on this?
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The Senate spent the day debating a bill that would provide billions of dollars in aid to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan. But something else is also tucked into the bill: an ultimatum to TikTok’s Beijing-based parent company, ByteDance, to either sell the popular app or see it effectively banned in the United States.
Tech policy reporter Cristiano Lima-Strong says this is the latest attempt by Congress to force a sale of TikTok, which some lawmakers say poses a national security threat by putting the data of roughly 170 million Americans in the hands of the Chinese government. While a previous version of this bill had stalled in the Senate, this time the legislation is on the path to becoming law.
Cristiano joins Post Reports to break down the latest developments surrounding this bill as well as its potential consequences.
Today’s show was produced by Emma Talkoff, with help from Elana Gordon. It was mixed by Sean Carter and edited by Monica Campbell.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Mr President, today the Senate sends a unified message to the entire world. |
| 0:10.3 | America will always defend democracy in its hour of need. |
| 0:15.0 | Today, the U.S. Senate advanced major legislation that would provide billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. |
| 0:26.0 | In a procedural vote, the Senate showed it has enough support to clear a final vote to then |
| 0:31.0 | move the package to the President. Here is Senator Chuck Schumer. |
| 0:34.7 | A lot of people inside and outside the Congress wanted this package to fail. |
| 0:39.1 | But today those in Congress who stand on the side of democracy are winning the day. |
| 0:46.2 | But there's something else in this package. |
| 0:50.6 | Here is Republican John Thune speaking on the Senate floor earlier. |
| 0:54.0 | The bill before us today includes some new measures. |
| 0:57.0 | Notable among them is legislation to ban Tik-Tok |
| 1:01.0 | if the company is not purchased by an entity unaffiliated with the |
| 1:04.7 | Chinese Communist Party. Senator Thune said this potential Tic-Toc ban is about |
| 1:10.0 | preventing China from accessing Americans information. |
| 1:14.0 | But this proposal has created a massive backlash from Tik-Toc's many loyal users. |
| 1:20.0 | This is the most significant threat from the US government ever to this wildly popular video sharing app that's become a huge part of American culture and also commerce. |
| 1:32.0 | Christiano Lima Strong is a tech policy. and also Commerce. |
| 1:32.6 | Christina Strong is a tech policy reporter at the post. |
| 1:36.6 | And as he points out, this is not the first time that lawmakers have tried to ban Tik-Toc. |
| 1:42.3 | But previous attempts didn't work because of legal concerns over |
| 1:45.7 | executive overreach and free speech violations. |
| 1:49.3 | Christiano says, this time is different. |
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