Sen. McConnell backs TikTok bill, Pence worries it’ll get lost amid ‘the fog of presidential politics’

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell spoke in favor of the bill that would require TikTok to divest from ByteDance.

“This is the matter that deserves Congress’ urgent attention, and I’ll support common sense bipartisan steps to take one of Beijing’s favorite tools of coercion and espionage off the table,” McConnell said on the Senate floor Monday.

McConnell cited national security threats and called the social media app a “tool of surveillance and of propaganda.”

The Kentucky senator’s comments come as the Senate has slowed down on the TikTok bill. It sailed through the House and enjoyed bipartisan support in March, but the Senate hasn’t moved at the same speed as the House.

Introduced by Rep. Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., alongside Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., the bill gives TikTok six months to divest from ByteDance. If the bill passes and the company does not divest, then the app would face a ban. TikTok has issued statements in opposition to the bill, saying that it would curtail freedom of speech and impact businesses and creators.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., has not yet indicated exactly when he’ll bring the bill forward. Reuters reported, “Schumer’s statement did not outline a specific position on TikTok but said ‘in the weeks and months ahead, we have the opportunity to make progress on bipartisan bills’ including a measure on TikTok.”

While politicians have expressed varying concerns around the app, from mental health to the way the company handles user data, this bill focuses on national security concerns.

A February report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated that “China is demonstrating a higher degree of sophistication in its influence activity.”

“TikTok accounts run by a PRC propaganda arm reportedly targeted candidates from both political parties during the U.S. midterm election cycle in 2022,” the report said.

Rep. John Curtis, R-Utah, has spoken of these concerns to the Deseret News before, expressing his support of the bill. “What really alarms me is that they could then use that same technique to influence an election or taint somebody’s opinion about an issue,” Curtis said.

President Joe Biden has said that he would sign the bill if it came across his desk.

Former President Donald Trump issued an executive order in August 2020 banning U.S. companies from engaging in transactions with ByteDance due to national security and privacy risks. Trump told CNBC that he still had concerns about national security around TikTok, but that a ban would double the size of Facebook — something he said he did not want to do.

Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence, has spoken in favor of the bill and said he’s afraid that it could become “lost in the fog of presidential politics.”

In an interview with Fox News Digital, Pence said his organization, Advancing American Freedom, is launching a campaign to support the bill. “We’ll be not only calling on people to call Schumer, but also to call the relevant Democrat senators in those states to urge them also to step forward in support of forcing the sale of TikTok and bringing this matter to the floor to a vote and to final passage.”

If the bill does come to the Senate, it still faces an uncertain future.

One of the bill’s most vocal opponents is Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who said in a social media post that the bill was “a disturbing gift of unprecedented authority to President Biden and the Surveillance State that threatens the very core of American digital innovation and free expression.”

Other senators have come out in support of the bill. In March, senators were briefed by the FBI, Justice Department and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence on security threats potentially posed by TikTok, according to Axios. Sen. John Hickenlooper, D-Colo., member of the Senate Commerce Committee, said the TikTok bill is something the Senate “should move faster on, not slower.”

Utah’s senators differ in their views on the bill. Sen. Mike Lee said he opposes the bill because it gives too much power to the executive branch. If the bill passed in its current form, it would allow the executive branch to force sales of other apps owned by a “foreign adversary” if the president determined them to pose “a significant threat to the National Security of the United States.”

“Sen. Lee wants to prevent the CCP from accessing our data through TikTok, but is concerned that the current bill gives too much power to the executive branch to ban or control companies they don’t like,” Billy Gribbin, director of communications for Lee, previously told the Deseret News.

Sen. Mitt Romney told KUTV in an interview that he supported the bill. “The reality is we’re not going to see TikTok close down. It’s a very valuable property. It can be owned by American investors, it can be owned by the public, but it shouldn’t be owned by the Chinese government,” said Romney.