The TikTok Ban Has A Sneaky Provision

Urge your Senator to vote against the ban.

It has been a while since the America First world has been so deeply and vociferously divided on a proposed bill in Congress. This week, as the U.S. House considered the “TikTok Ban,” I watched multiple people I respect and admire post strongly different takes on the issue.

Tucker Carlson also opposed the bill and invited on Rand Paul, usually a pretty steady Eddie, to discuss why. Tucker made excellent opening remarks about the political environment in which this bill is being passed, and I firmly believe that type of context is important when approaching a bill like the TikTok Ban. Why are all of these congressmen so gung ho to pass this bill while they permit China to buy American farmland, manufacture our medicine, and fly spy balloons over the sovereign territory of the United States? This should set off alarm bells.

But Tucker’s interview with Rand Paul did not really discuss the text of the bill or explain specifically why the language was problematic, which would have been the most helpful analysis to allow Americans to make up their minds.

Finally, Friday morning, I sat down and read the language of the bill, and I had to conclude that if I were in Congress, I would have voted against this bill.

The Actual Language of the Bill

To begin with, the bill bans “foreign adversary controlled applications” within the United States and her maritime borders. So the simple question is, how does the bill define each one of those terms?

According to the bill, a “FOREIGN ADVERSARY COUNTRY” means “a country specified in section 4872(d)(2) of title 10, United States Code.” As proponents of the bill are quick to note, that is a limited list: “(A) the Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea; (B) the People’s Republic of China; (C) the Russian Federation; and (D) the Islamic Republic of Iran.” So far, so good.

What does it mean to be controlled by a foreign adversary? Pay close attention to subsection (c).

That is the key right there.

The bill defines “controlled by a foreign adversary” to include “a person subject to the direction or control of a foreign person or entity described in subparagraph (A) or (B).” To me, such a provision is simply too nebulous. No matter how narrowly defined the rest of the bill might or might not be, it only takes one door left open, like this one, to blow the entire thing up.

Proponents of the bill would likely argue that “subject to the direction or control” is a legal term of art, and while in another era I would agree that such language provided some protection, in our current era, it does not.

After all, there was a riot at the U.S. Capitol and, ever since, the ruling elite (and the sheeple who watch mainstream media) have pretended it was an armed insurrection that nearly toppled our government. To make matters worse, the justice system has accepted this charade, and, as I type, there are hundreds of political prisoners—American citizens—suffering in American prisons.

Sadly, the January 6th detainees are not the only example of how grossly our society is willing to cast aside common sense and reason. Look at Donald Trump’s recent loss in New York court, where the judge held, among similarly unrealistic determinations, that Mar-a-Lago is worth a paltry $18 million. President Trump was ordered to pay a $454 million judgment. Just to appeal this punitive judgment (to another leftist layer of the New York court system) would require President Trump to post the entire sum as bond. This drama has been playing out as President Trump also litigates the E. Jean Carroll case, where he was ordered to pay her $94 million, and all his other suits, including a criminal prosecution. It should be clear that the purpose is to destroy Donald Trump. And the law has been twisted to assist those efforts.

In such an unprecedented time in our history—when the federal intelligence organization have mobilized against rioters and a former President is targeted for such complete destruction—who truly believes that the statutory construction of “subject to the direction or control” could provide even a slight protection?

When Tucker Carlson traveled to Russia to do his job—journalism—the entire mainstream media of the English speaking world declared him a mouthpiece of Russia and a puppet of Putin. If the bar is that low, it is conceivable that our Deep State could easily cook up an excuse to target someone like Elon Musk or future social media operators that don’t toe the Left’s line.

There is no room anymore for common sense to play a role in American politics. Everything must be spelled out, and we must be hyper vigilant.

Other Issues

There are other issues with the bill, like the fact that TikTok won’t go away; it will be transferred to new ownership through a forced sale. Sean Davis, co-founder of the Federalist, argued:

Deep State toadies are taking advantage of anti-China sentiment to transfer TikTok’s surveillance apparatus from China’s evil surveillance state to the U.S. government’s evil surveillance state. TikTok isn’t going to be banned, because neither the CCP-run Chinese government nor the CCP-owned U.S. government wants to lose such a valuable tool for spying on Americans and poisoning the minds of their children. Instead, the corrupt U.S. intelligence bureaucracy wants control of TikTok, which is why it included the divestment mandate. Only a handful of U.S. companies are capable of buying and managing TikTok, and they already function as appendages of the Deep State surveillance apparatus.

I also noted that the bill includes a provision that vests exclusive jurisdiction in the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. This is not an unprecedented clause. Various bills, often relating to the military or various agency actions, include such a provision. But I don’t like it. It means that more conservative judges in better circuits, like the Fifth Circuit, would never be able to weigh in on a challenge to action under this bill. The extremely liberal D.C. Circuit would have sole authority (before a hearing at SCOTUS).

I think TikTok should be banned, but I agree it is a daring and delicate move to ban a social media company, and we must do it in a way that provides maximum safety to American speech. Congress could have simply banned TikTok/ByteDance, but it went farther. It had to aggrandize more power to itself. It had to create a bill that had more universal application. It had to leave the door open to future federal mischief.

I am left with a compounded disgust for our feckless Congress, which fails to defend Americans from the invasion of our homeland from the south, sells out the ordinary American worker, and only seems motivated by easy action that will generate sound bites for social media.

As this bill heads to the Senate for approval, please urge your senators to reject it.

If you are on social media, you can view and share my video explaining my read of the bill here on Instagram.