The latest attempt at forcing the divestiture of TikTok entitled the “Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, (HR 7521)” was recently introduced by Representatives Mike Gallagher (R-Wi.) and Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.). Today the bill passed the House by a vote of 352-65, demonstrating deep bipartisan support. However, the legislation now goes to the Senate where TikTok has been conducting a fire sale. You know there’s a recession when TikTok lays off Senators, so the economy is all good today.

The legislation would require TikTok’s Beijing-based parent corporation ByteDance to divest TikTok within 165 days or face a comprehensive ban in the U.S. This move has been met with resistance from ByteDance, which has launched a no-shit aggressive campaign against the legislation. They argue that the bill would violate the First Amendment rights of its 170 million U.S. users and harm thousands of small businesses that rely on the platform. Of course the First Amendment issue is kind of BS because the legislation is not mandating or regulating speech and is focused on national security–this comes as no surprise to MTP readers as we have been on the TikTok/CCP angle for several years. If you want to know how the Chinese government would implement their National Security Law, just read up on Jimmy Lai..

Of course TikTok’s lobbyists are running the old SOPA playbook all over again, this time with added YouTube. TikTok users swarmed over the Capitol to protest and impede today’s vote. Can Camp Pelosi redux be far behind? Well, no, because this was a digital swarm which is just different, you see. It’s just different when Big Tech tries to protect an IPO.

#TikTok showed users a screen asking them to lobby on its behalf. For some users "the message could not be dismissed: users who wished to use the app had to either press the button to call the Congressional switchboard or hard-reset the app." #AIEthics https://t.co/YpHmXoXS0R

— Carissa Véliz (@CarissaVeliz) March 14, 2024

TikTok’s tactics are very reminiscent of Google’s tactics with SOPA or Napster’s tactics with Camp Chaos.

But not even Napster had the brass to go to full on papal indulgences. Yes, that’s right: NunTok will save the IPO.

Nuns good, TikTok bad! Please.

I wonder which Washington lobbyist thought of NunTok? Perhaps this guy: