TikTok logo displayed on the screen of a smartphone.
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U.S. lawmakers are considering changes to address concerns about a bill that would give the Biden administration new powers to ban Chinese company TikTok, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, which co-sponsored the bill, said on Monday.
Democratic Senator Mark Warner told Reuters that TikTok, a short-video app owned by ByteDance, was aggressively lobbying against the curbs bill, “after the bill was introduced in March, our momentum slowed a bit. “.
Warner said lawmakers had introduced “a proposal on a series of amendments to make that clear,” and responded to criticisms that individual Americans might be affected or that the bill represented a broad expansion of government powers.
“We can address these issues in a fair way,” Warner said.
The legislation approved by the White House would give the Commerce Department new powers to review, block and resolve a range of transactions involving foreign information and communications technology that pose national security risks.
“I would approve TikTok, they spent $100 million lobbying and slowed our momentum,” Warner said, adding that initially it seemed almost “too easy” to get the bill approved.
TikTok did not immediately respond to Warner’s request for comment on its lobbying assessment.
In March, Republican Senator Rand Paul blocked fast-tracking a separate TikTok ban bill introduced by Senator Josh Hawley, who said the Limits Act would “”It didn’t ban TikTok. It gave the president a whole bunch of new powers.”
The Biden administration asked TikTok’s Chinese owners in March to divest their stake or face a U.S. ban. In 2020, then-President Donald Trump tried to ban TikTok, but was blocked by a US court.
Warner said there was a lot of talk about the bill, adding that it could be appended to the annual defense bill or could be part of a China-related bill that Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer wants.
The need for legislation is obvious, he said.
“There are three or four other apps that are controlled by China, so we need a fair rules-based process to deal with this, not a one-off,” Warner said.
TikTok, used by more than 150 million Americans, said it had spent more than $1.5 billion on strict data security efforts and denied espionage allegations.
The company is fighting a ban in Montana that will go into effect Jan. 1. A judge has scheduled a hearing on TikTok’s request for Oct. 12.