The New York Times reports that although anti-TikTok fever is high in the United States, China is taking a low-key approach to things:
The fervor has not yet triggered a high-alert response from China’s leaders or prompted retaliatory threats against American companies. Instead, officials in Beijing have blasted the bill but largely reiterated common criticisms of U.S. policy as unfair to China.
....“China is not ready to pull the trigger outright for a full scale retaliation against what the United States is doing,” said Scott Kennedy, a China specialist at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
Retaliate? What can they do? Ban Facebook and Twitter and Gmail and Google and YouTube and Instagram and Bloomberg and the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and WhatsApp and Reddit and LinkedIn and Wikipedia?
Oh right. They've already done that. In fact, even TikTok is banned in China.
This is the one reason for banning TikTok that I have a lot of sympathy for. Dangerous or not, why should we allow Chinese social media companies to operate freely in the US when US social media companies are universally banned in China? TikTok earned about $16 billion in the US last year, and I can't think of any good reason to allow that when US companies aren't allowed to earn a penny in China.
Oddly, this is not something that seems to bother most people. Instead, it's all about the Chinese Communist Party turning our teens into socialist zombies, which is faintly ridiculous. Why not just make this a standard trade dispute, where pretty much everything supports the US position?
Whatever is done, we can't afford to let Mnuchin & company take it over. if that is why the Rs are pushing to force its sale, Democrats shouldn't support that legislation.
Right-wingers are salivating at the prospect of doing to TikTok what Musk has done to Twitter. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/beltway-confidential/2921601/tiktok-needs-conservative-us-buyer/
This is basically the entire reason I (mildly) support a forced sale. It has become a commonplace these days that economic integration with China has totally backfired, giving the CCP huge leverage over the U.S. Well, maybe we should push back? I understand that trade wars are bad, but as many have noted, this seems like a place where maybe trade wars are fine, insofar as I don't really care if TikTok goes away entirely.
What "huge leverage" do they have, exactly? I can see the "if you squint" argument for things like manufactured goods that are raw materials for other things made/sold in the US, but China is very dependent upon that trade - more so now that their export-focused economy has been stalling out. And the CHIPS act is one example where the US has invested in addressing this production imbalance, so in that area at least the fever dream of deficit hawks that China would "call in our debts" seems to be a pretty weak sauce argument. How is your argument different? Is it different?
The reason China is being muted with this criticism is because they have basically no leverage at this point.
They have economic leverage over all the companies who either want to do business in China or have a supply chain dependent on China, which is a lot of them. This is why Hollywood movies, the NBA, Apple, etc. all humiliate themselves to accommodate the Chinese government's sensitivities.
If you want to argue that this is all small potatoes in the scheme of things, that's fine. But punishing TikTok is also small potatoes in the scheme of things, and it sends the message, "If you want to force American companies to bend to your (literal) party line, fine, but there are consequences." Do I think that message will make any difference? Not really. But so be it.
OK, well I can agree that they're small potatoes. I'd also argue that they don't have huge leverage over, say, the NBA - it's simply an expansion of the NBA's market. If the NBA loses China it doesn't cease to exist.
I agree with this point.
I would like to add some comment. I think there's pretty clearly some classified concerns in play here, which means that there's stuff they aren't telling us.
In situations like this, I ask myself which people involved do I trust the most, and how have they weighed in on this. Here's my list:
Nancy Pelosi: Voted for
Anna Eshoo, my own and Google and Facebooks Congressperson: Voted for
Adam Schiff: The voice in the house I most strongly associate with Anti-Trump and national security: Voted for
The Rep for Apple's district (only about 5 miles away from Googles HQ, but that's districts for ya. is Ro Khanna. He voted against. I don't know him as much, though.
Mark Warner, chair of Senate Intelligence is for it.
Joe Biden is for it.
That's a pretty good list. Some other folks that may matter more to others than to me:
AOC: voted against. She gets to do that. She doesn't have as much influence on me as the above list.
Jim Himes: Ranking member of the House Intelligence committee voted against. Not sure what to make of that. Maybe he agrees on the problem, but not the solution?
I'm not mentioning any Republicans. They don't have much weight with me, even on NatSec matters. Certain ones once did, but they have kind of trashed their credibility.
I am definitely not going to follow a logic of "X is for it so it must be bad" That way lies serious misinformation.
I am also not going to endorse "Y gave a really dumb reason for it so I'm against it". I ignore dumb reasons, and the people who give them. I don't get reactionary.
Excellent point. There is a good chance that there is anther level of (classified) knowledge that we do not have that is driving a lot of peoples' opinions in Government.
Hadn't thought of that, Kevin, but I totally agree. At least trade retaliation would be a far more legitimate reason than the bullshit reason that justified the bill that got through the House. The only thing we get bi-partisanship on these days are crap bills.
Kara Swisher said she uses a burner phone for TikTok. She's probably kidding, but she pointed out that the threat TikTok presents is not overblown.
But I really don't care either way. Every social media platform has video clips. The only people who give two serious shits are the influencers stuck on TikTok. The youth backlash will last about as long as their short attention spans can tolerate.
This has been my position ever since talk of banning TT started. Give the Chinese a bit of their own medicine
So after multiple posts being skeptical of banning TikTok, in the end, as long as someone says the magical Drum words, you support it? Someone just had to sprinkle a different excuse on it, and that was enough for you? What was even the point of your previous posts? It’s all just making the right excuse then for the most people, so who cares what your previous objections were? Because clearly you were one of a couple people who just needed someone to say the magical phrase of “trade retaliation.”
I’m a longtime reader. I’ve actually always been fine with a TikTok ban, because I think the anti-ban case is pretty thin when compared with how much of garbage TikTok is as a platform. But this turnabout negates everything you’ve ever said about TikTok and makes me question a lot else about how you approach the positions you come to.
Kevin can change his mind!
Listened to Gluesenkamp last night (since I'm up here in WA's 3rd) and her complaints were nutty. 'Oh no! Children were motivated to call me! See how much control they have?'
Ugh. See that you're taking candy from babies? Duh. Of course they'll react.
I believe that China already bans Tik Tok inside China.
It's hard to think of more naked hypocrisy than Chinese Government criticism of a US potential ban. Not that fears of hypocrisy ever stopped the Chinese (or so many others) before.
TikTok isn’t “banned” in China. Rather, TikTok is the international version of Douyin that’s available for non-Chinese.
As long as we're honest with ourselves, eh? C'est-à-dire, make sure the "right" people get the profits...
"Let's have our government start controlling social media because they do it in China" does not seem to me to be sound liberal policy. Kevin's added another half-baked reason to the numerous ones already advanced by various people.
The bottom line remains that “Not a single thing that we heard in today’s classified briefing was unique to TikTok. It was things that happen on every single social media platform.” - Rep Sara Jacobs, D-Calif.
You clearly don't know shit about getting on TV.
The bill appears DOA in Senate. Thankfully. Also, the platforms mentioned by Kevin are not banned by China. But China (like every country) requires firms to follow its laws. Which for tech platforms generally means a PRC legally-compliant version has to be in place. Which is why, say, Apple's App Store can operate there. And Microsoft's Bing and MSN. And Spotifty. And...ByteDance.
Yes, "legally compliant" in a Communist dictatorship means the version is going to be shitty by our Western standards. So Kevin's not really calling for "protectionism" — he's calling for our country to move just a little bit closer to China's authoritarian model in terms of curbing the freedom of its citizens.
To put it another way, China's not "winning" with its heavy-handed censorship (and America isn't losing from her openness). Far from it!
We shouldn't emulate them.
(If you want something Chinese to emulate, try bullet trains, subways, public restrooms, payment platforms or the blissful lack of tipping culture). America is vastly superior in myriad areas: air quality, water quality, political/legal system, healthcare, education, housing quality, road safety, bricks and mortar retail, banking/financial services, movies, music. And yes, lack of censorship.
I love ppl who complain about tipping, it just shows everybody else how cheap you are.
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Would Facebook and Twitter and Gmail and Google and YouTube and Instagram and Bloomberg and the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and WhatsApp and Reddit and LinkedIn and Wikipedia be willing to keep all Chinese data in China using a Chinese provider? Would they censor positive views about Israeli aggression at behest of China's security orgs like they censor positive views of Palestinian resistance at the behest of US and Israeli security orgs?