President Joe Biden‘s campaign and administration have taken contrasting and strained approaches to the ubiquitous social media platform TikTok, using it to reach out to young voters while also weighing a ban on the app.
The Biden campaign released its first ad on TikTok after the Super Bowl on Sunday, a sudden change in its approach to the platform. While the White House has been scrutinizing the Chinese-owned app over national security concerns, the Biden campaign and Democratic leaders have also tried to use the app to win over voters. The result has been a two-faced approach to the controversial app, which has been the target of scrutiny from Congress and regulators for several years over its connections to China and allegations of surveillance.
Here’s how Biden has handled TikTok.
2024 campaign
On Sunday, the Biden campaign opened a TikTok account, on which it posted its first video, captioned “lol hey guys,” and created a biographical sketch for Biden that said he “grows the economy.” The first video featured a staffer asking Biden about which team he supported in the Super Bowl.
The team behind Biden’s campaign said it is taking advanced safety precautions to ensure the app is secure from Chinese surveillance or hacking, according to the Washington Post. The campaign also emphasized that its use of the app is separate from the efforts by the White House to review whether it needed to take action against TikTok.
Hosting creators
The White House has tried to use TikTok creators to boost its messaging. In 2021, it recruited a group of TikTok influencers to encourage their viewers to get the COVID-19 vaccine.
Biden officials also hosted a Zoom briefing for a group of TikTok creators in 2022 to brief them on what was going on in Ukraine at the time. The meeting was billed as ensuring that users were receiving accurate information on TikTok since it had become a popular platform for spreading real-time footage of the war in Ukraine. The White House also invited eight Gen-Z influencers in October 2022 to get some face-to-face time with the president in Washington.
The White House has also dedicated multiple staffers to networking with influencers.
Lobbyists
Multiple TikTok lobbyists visited Biden between 2022 and 2023, according to records, although it is unclear if the lobbyists were doing so on behalf of TikTok. The lobbyists visited at least 40 times. The company is spending millions to convince Congress and the White House it is not a threat to the United States.
National restrictions
The Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. has been reviewing TikTok’s presence in the U.S. for several years. The process will determine if the app’s parent company, ByteDance, will be required to sell TikTok to a U.S. company or if it can continue to operate under different regulations.
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The company has attempted to assuage worries about the app by creating “Project Texas,” an arrangement that includes keeping user data on domestic servers and implementing various safeguards meant to guarantee that data and the algorithm are removed from the influence of the Chinese Communist Party. The company claims U.S. user data are safe from Chinese officials, who can use national security laws to look at any data owned by companies operating in China. It’s unclear if Project Texas’s practices are as secure as claimed, though, since multiple employees have reported that data were sent outside to ByteDance via email and that they cannot keep up with all of the algorithmic changes released by ByteDance.
Biden also signed into law a ban on installing TikTok on government devices.
