Carlson: Anti-TikTok Bill ‘Aimed At Controlling The American Population’
Lawmakers in both parties have been pushing for a nationwide ban on the China-owned social media platform TikTok over concerns about privacy and sharing user data with China’s communist government.
Some individuals on both sides of the aisle, however, do not believe that such a blanket ban would be good for the United States.
U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) shared her argument against banning the app in a social media post this week.
It appears that her position might share some common ground with Fox News Channel personality Tucker Carlson, who recently opined that one bipartisan proposal to ban the app would only play into China’s hands.
He took aim at the Restricting the Emergence of Security Threats that Risk Information and Communications — or RESTRICT — Act introduced by Sens. Mark Warner (D-VA) and John Thune (R-SD), noting that the stated purpose of the bill is to stop “foreign adversaries” from using TikTok to interfere in U.S. elections.
“Because of course, election interference from Twitter and Facebook is no problem at all,” Carlson added. “But election interference through TikTok is totally unacceptable.”
If approved, he said the legislation would accomplish an insidious goal that might not be apparent at first glance.
“This bill isn’t about banning TikTok,” the host claimed. “It is never about what they say it is. Instead, this bill would give enormous and terrifying new powers to the federal government to punish American citizens and regulate how they communicate with one another.”
Although the RESTRICT Act does not name TikTok directly, it would impact technology from China and other foreign adversaries, including Cuba, Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and North Korea.
“This is not an effort to push back against China, it is part of a strategy to make America much more like China, with the government in charge of what you read and see and with terrifying punitive powers at their fingertips,” Carlson told viewers.
He concluded that the U.S. government has embraced similar overreaches in the past, including in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
“TikTok is bad, sure,” Carlson concluded. “Al-Qaeda was terrible, of course. But these measures are not aimed at stopping the foreign threat, they are aimed at controlling the American population.”
