House Speaker Says Lawmakers to Move Forward With TikTok Bill

Kevin McCarthy, the speaker of the House of Representatives, announced on Sunday that legislation will be passed to address concerns about TikTok’s regional security. McCarthy claimed that the Chinese communist government had access to the user data for the brief video app.

There are growing visits in the US to either pass bipartisan legislation to grant President Joe Biden’s leadership the constitutional authority to find a ban or to ban TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance. The application was reportedly prohibited from being installed on devices owned by the U.S. government.

McCarthy stated on Twitter that the House would move along with legislation to shield Americans from the Chinese Communist Party’s modern tentacles.

Shou Zi Chew, the CEO of TikTok, was grilled by politicians from both parties about national protection and some issues pertaining to the game, which has 150 million American customers, during his roughly five-hour appearance before a House Committee on Thursday.

The CEO of TikTok was questioned about whether the game has spied on Americans at Beijing’s get during the hearing on Thursday. Chew replied,” No.”

Again, Republican Representative Neal Dunn cited the company’s reporting from December that some ByteDance employees from China improperly accessed two journalists’ TikTok user data and were fired. He rephrased his inquiry as to whether ByteDance was spying.

Chew remarked,” I don’t believe spying is the appropriate term.” Before being cut off, he continued by saying that the findings involved an” internal analysis.”

Republican Senator McCarthy remarked in a tweet on Sunday,” It’s very concerning that the CEO of TikTok can’t be honest and admit what we already know to be true— China has access to the user data.”

According to the company,” Project Texas ,” which currently employs close to 1,500 full-time employees and has a contract with Oracle Corp. to store TikTok’s U.S. user data, has spent more than$ 1.5 billion on data security efforts.

Rep. Mike Gallagher( R-Wis. ), the head of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, told ABC News on Sunday that Chew’s appearance before Congress on Thursday” actually increased the likelihood that Congress will take some action.”

Although they have not yet directly backed a U.S. restrictions, many Democrats have also voiced their concerns.