PROMINENT DEMOCRATS QUESTION BILL
A number of prominent Democrats in the House voted against the Bill including House Democratic Whip Kathleen Clark, Arizona Senate candidate Ruben Gallego, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as well as the top Democrats on the Judiciary, Ways and Means, Transportation and Intelligence committees.
“There are serious antitrust and privacy questions here, and any national security concerns should be laid out to the public prior to a vote,” Ocasio-Cortez said.
Senate Commerce Committee chair Maria Cantwell, who will play an important role in the Senate’s next move, said she wants legislation “that could hold up in court”, and is considering a separate Bill, but is not sure what her next step is.
The vote comes just over a week since the Bill was proposed following one public hearing with little debate, and after action in Congress had stalled for more than a year. Last month, President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign joined TikTok, raising hopes among TikTok officials that legislation was unlikely this year.
Several dozen TikTok users rallied outside the Capitol before the vote. The company paid for their travel to Washington and their accommodation, a TikTok spokesperson said.
The group included Mona Swain, 23, who said she had joined TikTok in 2019, during her freshman year at college pursuing musical theatre. Now a full-time content creator, she said she was paying her mother’s mortgage and for her brother and sister’s college educations with her earnings from the app.
“It’s gonna put a lot of people out of work, which is the scariest part,” Swain said of the Bill.
Source: CNA
