TikTok ban puts jobs of thousands of US workers in jeopardy, California senator warns

California Sen. Laphonza Butler urged President Joe Biden on Wednesday to consider the fate of thousands of U.S. employees of TikTok hours after he signed legislation that will force a sale of the app or ban it from the U.S.

The forced divestiture of TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, was part of a legislative package that included military aid to Ukraine. It passed the Senate in a 79-18 vote, which included support from Butler.

Butler, a former labor leader appointed in October by Gov. Gavin Newsom to fill the seat of the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein, said the administration should weigh the consequences of the legislation on the company’s approximately 8,000 workers, who are mostly in California and New York.

“Their employment and the livelihoods of their families hang in the balance,” she wrote.

TikTok would be blocked in the country by next year if it doesn’t find a new owner. The company is expected to challenge the law in court, arguing it violates the First Amendment rights of its 170 million U.S. users.

Butler did not recommend a specific course of action. She noted only that the “labor implications” of the forced divestiture have “not been part of the broader” discussion of TikTok, which the U.S. government views as a national security threat because of the app’s ties to the Chinese government.

Some of those American TikTok workers, she wrote, helped authorities understand the national security threat and data security concerns raised by the company’s Chinese ownership.

“In turn, we must acknowledge the impact on TikTok workers, and on our local economies, as we determine the path forward,” she wrote.