Bytedance does not have an army of lobbies like Meta. X and Meta very much want this to happen. This isn't about draconian censorship issues. We have stupid people like AOC using tiktok completely oblivious to the thought the Chinese government has access to the app and data. The US has no means to ensure Bytedance is indeed protecting the data from the CCP and or using the algos to push pro-CCP propaganda.
It seems I keep some poor company. Looks like a bill of attainder, which is prohibited in the Constitution. I say unAmerican and not unConstitutional because I know the legal maneuvering around all that will be complicated, but the spirit of the Article is to prevent the legislature from singling people out in their legislating for punishment. TikTok seems to be targeted here, even if the bill theoretically applies to others as well. It looks like more than a mere regulatory requirement, but an intent to force the company into a specific course of action -- to sell (and under duress) so that some American company can reap the profits instead of a Chinese one. And all this to avoid doing the more necessary thing, which is to make a data security framework that would protect Americans from all the tech companies, including the American ones. As to our old rules, media is international now and "foreign" is an odd fit. TikTok could have been structured in a way that American consumers could use it with no company assets on US soil. So what does that mean to 'operate in' the US? And if TikTok could still count even operating from abroad, does that give the FCC broad latitude to censor what media Americans are otherwise able to consume? A foreign ownership rule doesn't make sense anymore. And in any case, re-asserting such a rule and then applying it to TikTok is ex-post-facto legislating which is also addressed alongside bills of attainder in the Constitution. If they were to be fair about setting the rules for the market, they would have a grandfather clause to ensure the TikTok's current position is unaffected.
I dont agree that its a bill of attainder at all. The Supreme Court's rulings on bills of attainder have never once suggested that divestitures require a trial. And there's just so much case law supporting the right to limit foreign property ownership or limit the purchase of US assets (whether physical or not). States have been implementing regulations on foreign ownership since independence. My own industry (airlines) has limited foreign ownership to 25% for over a century. You also call this ex post facto which effectively means you can't regulate companies since any regulation becomes ex post facto. Even a rule requiring data localization for TikTok would be illegal under this logic. Frankly most regulation would be illegal by this logic. But it doesn't matter because the Supreme Court has held that the ex post facto provision only applies to cases involving the US criminal code. The US has the ability to retroactively, regulate, tax and fine entities and this has been repeatedly upheld by the Supreme Court as a result. But bottom line, there is not a single example of a divestiture of foreign company that has ever been ruled unconstitutional. CFIUS literally ordered a Chinese company to divest a US entity two years ago. And we've had other examples of divestitures on Chinese companies over the last few years. Its fine if you disagree with forcing ByteDance to divest, but the constitutionality argument to me is just silly. If anything, Congress passing a law is fairer than CFIUS ordering a divestiture.
this is The Patriot Act for the internet they promised us The Patriot Act would only be used on foreigners, but it's been used heavily to target domestic political opposition you don't think the power to declare Tik Tok a foreign threat will be turned against domestic political speech? They accused Trump of being a Russian agent for years and years.
Tiktok is just the face for the bill. It would apply to any similar company. It would force the sell of the social media provider in the USA and be ran by a US company if I remember right. There is a process involved but that is basically it. It had a lot of support in congress... and Biden said he will sign the bill if it passes the Sentate.
Trump signed 2 Executive Orders attempting to accomplish the same thing, but now Trumpers are anti this bill? FWIW, I'm not a fan of the ban then or now.
I'm not a lawyer and I'm not making a constitutional argument. I said it was unAmerican and I'm looking to the constitution as an indicator of the values we hold, not as to what we can get away with. You asked me why it was unAmerican, so I explained to you how ideally we do not target individuals with legislation and we do not change the rules of engagement after the fact. This does not extend to regulation, because our purpose in regulation is to keep the players in place but have them participate under certain minimum requirements. But, the proposal to ban TikTok is not any species of regulation, because the owner itself is being ordered to divest and not participate. When TikTok started here, it was legal for them to be here and be owned by the Chinese. Now, this law essentially undermines their sale value by proscribing the list of allowable buyers while also foreclosing the option to not sell. It's like what Scottie Pippen did to the Rockets when he trashed Barkley on TV way back when. It's offensive, and I still see no compelling reason why we need to hold our noses and do it anyway. And @Commodore might be protesting in parallel with me, but in no way do I agree with his conspiracy theories.
I personally dont like the that the first part of the legislative text specifically calls out bytedance. But the second clause actually makes this a broader regulation on social media ownership that prohibits foreign ownership of social media. Now I personally would have stuck with the 25% ownership clause that is applied to other industries but either way this is a foreign ownership regulation. I know you keep calling this un-American but you keep ignoring the fact that the US has been regulating foreign ownership of companies on national security grounds for decades (including forcing divestitures after the fact). This isn't some brand new thing. We've had foreign investment restrictions on industries and property since the founding of the country. When TikTok was started, it wasn't considered a national security threat because it had tiny usage within the broader social media ecosystem. The circumstances changed and members of Congress and the executive view it as a national security threat. That was the whole point of creating CFIUS. That's the same mechanism that we use to stop tech transfers in high risk areas. CFIUS has pushed through divestitures under this logic repeatedly. The only difference is that Congress (for once) is actually doing something via legislation instead of relying on the executive branch.
Why is TikTok considered a national security issue? And if it is, why aren’t other social media platforms owned by a single powerful billionaire (or private entity) also considered national security issues?
I don’t care one way or the other. Social media, whether domestic or foreign, and really all major corporations have made it a priority to own every single datapoint about our lives and we willingly give it to them through our smartphones in exchange for the dopamine spike inducing doom scrolling they offer.
My understanding is the collection of user data that is available to the PRC. The feeling is that a domestic company collecting user data isn’t a threat as the data is still being kept in the US.
It’s a good debate you and @JuanValdez having and gets to the substance of the issue. Is singling out a single company legal and even if so does it violate the principles of free speech and competition. I don’t really have an answer and don’t have a firm opinion on whether TikTok should be banned but it’s an important debate and one that goes beyond just fear of the evil CCP controlling our youth.
The concerns are: 1- Tracking of users' locations without their consent 2- Logging users' behaviors and actions without their consent 3- Being used by the PRC (or whoever else) for spreading propaganda and misinformation 1has happened in the past (by ByteDance, Facebook, Twitter, Google, and others). 2 is a suspicion but has also happened by multiple companies. 3 is a potential risk by state actors (but is ongoing by single billionaires). All social media and software have these negative potentials. Zuckerberg and Musk have the potential (esp with the help of AI) to spread their own propaganda and misinformation (Musk has done it plenty of times). Why is it that the PRC is specially called out as a risk but not very powerful billionaires? What about other software and hardware manufactured in China, Russia, and elsewhere with authoritarian government control over their private sectors? A better solution is better regulation on software that has these risks. Make stronger privacy laws. Enhance auditing to ensure privacy laws are met. Promote data portability (give users control of their data). Require strong disclosure on user data usage in plain, easy-to-read language and automatically opt-out of all data collection. Require public transparency on algorithmic usage, AI usage, and how content is moderated and presented. Push for international agreements where possible. And so on. Instead, what we have here are politicians riding on the anti-China/PRC bandwagon since Covid that push poorly thought-out legislation that doesn't solve these real risks.
This is such a LOSER issue for democrats This will definitely lose them some of the Youth Vote which they cannot afford Snatching Defeat from the Jaws of Victory one vote at a time This is ridiculous Democrats will vote: 1. No Tik Tok with Biden or 2. Tik Tok with Trump It sound silly but it could litereally be that simple Rocket River
It won't happen before the election, if ever. Lawsuit after lawsuit, assuming it actually becomes a signed bill.
