China On Notice – Senate Prepares Knockout Punch This Week

The Senate has earned the moniker “the world’s greatest deliberative body,” ostensibly due to their protracted decision-making process.

In March, the U.S. House passed a bill mandating the sale of TikTok to an American firm within six months of the sitting president’s signature, or face complete ban in the country.

Several influential Senate members were opposed to the sale, which is why the bill has stalled in the Senate despite strong support for it.

However, Speaker Mike Johnson’s parliamentary ploy has now pushed the matter into the Senate.

Johnson tacked the TikTok bill onto a package that would arm Israel and Ukraine and provide humanitarian relief to Gaza. The Senate would consider all four proposals together, making it extremely challenging to defeat a single section of the bill.

Senate Democrats would find it extremely difficult to vote against the plan. And that includes Republicans on the Senate Intelligence and Commerce Committees, Senators Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, who were also previously undecided about a ban on TikTok, as well as Democrats, such as Senate Commerce Committee Chair Maria Cantwell, who was previously skeptical of the legislation.

The bill must still pass constitutional muster in the federal courts, even if it passes and is signed by President Biden. Does it unfairly single out one business? Is it a violation of the law? In court, the ACLU and other advocacy groups plan to contest the bill.

I also wonder what China will do. On Friday, China allegedly told Apple to take Meta’s Threads and WhatsApp out of the app store. With both apps prohibited in China, the decision was significant. But one must take into account the Chinese reaction.

Although CIA Director William Burns believes there is “reason for worry” about the app, he is unsure if legislation is the best course of action.

As a result of TikTok’s Chinese parent company, Burns stated, “I think there is legitimate concern for the US government in that regard. The Chinese government is able to… insist upon extracting the private details of TikTok users in this nation and also to shape the content on TikTok to suit the best interests of the Chinese communist leadership.”

A single amendment to the bill, which increases the amount of time Bytedance has to sell TikTok to a local company from six months to a year, might have a significant impact. That modification was a major factor in Senator Cantwell’s decision to back the bill.

Politics:

“Cantwell had expressed additional constitutional concerns about the bill’s explicit designation of one firm and issues with due process, but it seemed that she was only willing to accept a one-year extension in the most recent negotiations. Could it be better? she asked POLITICO. Yes, but she was in favor of the House amendments. A Senate staffer, who requested anonymity so that they could speak more freely, said that Cantwell and Warner agreed to the one-year extension when they met with Schumer on Tuesday night. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who has opposed the plan from the beginning as government overreach and has First Amendment concerns for the 170 million Americans who would lose access to the app, is one possible area of contention. He is also against the bill’s current attachment to a larger package of international aid.”

Because of the legislation that accompanied the TikTok ban, its proponents were never going to win over Rand Paul. Paul can undoubtedly screw things up, but he cannot stop the law from passing.

Author: Blake Ambrose