DALLAS — Despite a widespread campaign among its 170 million users, TikTok was not able to fend off an initial vote by the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday to ban the social media platform unless it is somehow separated from its parent company in China.
The House vote of 352 to 65 recommends that TikTok be prohibited from U.S. app stores unless the social media platform is spun off from its Chinese parent company, ByteDance.
In testimony earlier this week, citing what he believes is the platform's potential to spread misinformation and collect user data at the behest of the Chinese government, FBI Director Christopher Wray called the platform a "pernicious risk."
"The ability to conduct influence operations that is extraordinarily difficult to detect," Wray said in testimony to Congress.
"Foreign adversaries like the Chinese communist party pose the greatest national threat of our time," said Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers of Washington State.
But in a public relations campaign to change minds in Washington, D.C., TikTok is enlisting the help of some of its biggest online stars: among them a cattle rancher from central Texas.
"So U.S. lawmakers in Washington DC want to ban TikTok. Well, they can get bent," said Brian Firebaugh, known as The Cattle Guy on his TikTok account. Firebaugh says the platform is vital to helping him build his business and his brand and was a key contributor to helping him raise money to ship badly needed cattle feed to the Texas panhandle after the recent series of devastating fires.
"We had to use TikTok as a way to provide immediate, immediate assistance to these ranchers," Firebaugh said in an interview provided by a TikTok public relations firm. "TikTok to me means freedom," he said.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry responded Wednesday by calling the initial vote by the U.S. House "an act of bullying." TikTok said in a written statement that a ban in the United States would...trample the First Amendment rights of 170 million Americans."
The initial vote by the House was bi-partisan. It had the support of Democrats like Congressman Colin Allred who said "Our national security is paramount and we must work together to ensure apps like TikTok are free from the harmful and malicious influence of the Chinese Communist Party."
President Biden has said he would sign such legislation. Former President Trump has suggested TikTok should not be banned, instead focusing his ire on Facebook.
"But the thing I don't like is that without TikTok you can make Facebook bigger. And I consider Facebook to be an enemy of the people," Trump said in a recent interview with CNBC.
“This process was secret and the bill was jammed through for one reason: it’s a ban,” a TikTok spokesperson said in a statement following the Wednesday House vote. “We are hopeful that the Senate will consider the facts, listen to their constituents, and realize the impact on the economy, 7 million small businesses, and the 170 million Americans who use our service.”
The discussion now moves to the U.S. Senate.