Two GOP lawmakers continue to press the reelection campaign for President Joe Biden to stop using the social media platform TikTok while the company is still owned by ByteDance, a company that has ties to the Chinese Communist Party.
The continued usage of the platform by Biden’s campaign is strange, considering the president recently signed a bill that will ban TikTok in the U.S. unless ByteDance sold to an American company.
In a news release on Monday, Republican Representative Troy Nehls of Texas said:
“Despite signing legislation into law acknowledging the national security threat posed by TikTok, Joe Biden’s presidential campaign continues using TikTok, blatantly ignoring the grave concerns his own administration’s officials have raised.”
On Friday, Nehls sent a letter to the president along with Republican Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa, hoping to address concerns they have about the president’s campaign continuing to use TikTok.
As Nehls said:
“By continuing to use TikTok, Joe Biden is putting politics over the safety of the American people. I’m proud to join Senator Ernst in calling on Joe Biden to suspend the use of his campaign’s TikTok account until it is out of the CCP’s hands and put the American people first.”
Last Wednesday, the president signed the bill that started a clock for ByteDance: Either they divest themselves from TikTok in six months, o r the app will face a complete ban in America.
The same day that Biden signed that law, though, his reelection campaign announced that it would continue to utilize the platform in its efforts to reach younger voters, who to this point seem to be leaning toward presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump over Biden.
Since the Biden campaign launched its TikTok account back in February, it has built 312,000 followers.
But, Ernst and Nehls wrote in their letter:
“TikTok has a proven track record of spying on U.S. citizens. China-based ByteDance executives used TikTok to spy on American journalists reporting on the application’s CCP ties. ByteDance employees reportedly even had access to a search tool allowing them to access the friends list of U.S. politicians and their families — including members of your own family.
“Unfortunately, your campaign appears poised to ignore your own administration officials’ warnings. [On February 12], your campaign joined TikTok, despite the long-standing security problems associated with using the CCP spyware. We are similarly worried that many members of your part also have TikTok accounts, using it to disseminate their political message despite the risks associated with the application.”
It seems as though high-ranking officials in Biden’s reelection campaign believe national security should take a backseat to their efforts to try to get the president back in the White House.
The deputy manager for the campaign, Rob Flaherty, said as much this week. He commented:
“We would be silly to write off any place where people are getting information about the president.”