A Republican-led bill that would ban popular social media app TikTok from all government devices unanimously passed a key vote in the Senate on Wednesday.
Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri introduced the No TikTok on Government Devices Act last month in the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which passed the bill with support from both parties.
Hawley called the social media giant “an immediate security threat.”
“This should not be a partisan issue and I’m glad to see my colleagues in the Senate act together to address Beijing’s covert data collection campaign,” Hawley said in a statement after the vote.
TikTok first came into the spotlight when former President Donald Trump tried to ban the app, which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance, and pushed the parent company to sell the app, which it is attempting to do.
EXCLUSIVE: SENATE REPUBLICANS PUSH FOR NATIONAL COMMISSION TO BALANCE BUDGET
Since the app is owned by a Chinese company, government officials suspect the company is required to report user data to the Chinese Communist Party and that TikTok cannot be trusted with the sensitive data on government devices in the United States.
The platform has already been banned from government devices in a number of agencies, including the Defense Department, the Department of Homeland Security, the State Department, and the Transportation Security Administration. Hawley’s legislation would ban the app from devices in all other parts of the federal government.
A similar version of the legislation was introduced in 2020 and easily passed in the Senate in August, but it was not voted on in the House.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
This time, the bill has some new co-sponsors: GOP Sens. Rick Scott and Marco Rubio of Florida and Tom Cotton of Arkansas. Republican Rep. Ken Buck of Colorado will also introduce similar legislation in the House.
