Security of the United States from the threat posed by foreign adversary controlled applications such as tiktok and any successor application or service, and any other application or service developed or provideed by bite byte dance limited or entity controlled by them. The speaker pro tempore pursuant to the rule, the gentlewoman from washington, mrs. Rodgers and the gentleman from new jersey, mr. Pallone each will control 20 minutes. For what purpose does the gentleman from kentucky seek recognition . Mr. Massie i rise to claim time in actual opposition to the bill. The speaker pro tempore is the gentleman from new jersey opposed to the motion . O. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from new jersey is not opposed to the motion. The gentleman from kentucky will control the 20 minutes in opposition. The gentlewoman from washington is recognized. Mrs. Rodgers . Mrs. Rodgers i ask mr. Speaker i yield myself such time as i may consume. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman is recognized. Mrs. Rodgers i rise today in support of h. R. 7521 the protecting americans from foreign adversary controlled applications act. Foreign adversaries pose the greatest National Threat of our time. Tiktok access to 177 million american users makes it a valuable propaganda tool for the c. C. P. To exploit. Over the past ween realtime how the c. C. P. Controlled tiktok, used its influence and power to force users to contact their representatives if they even wanted to continue using the app. And this is just a small taste of how the c. C. P. Weaponizes applications it controls to manipulate tens of millions of people to further its agenda. Todays legislation will end this abuy preventing apps controlled by foreign adversaries from targeting surveilling and manipulating the American People. Aven tiktok a clear choice. Separate from your Parent Company, which is beholden to the c. C. Pnd remain operational in the United States or side with the c. C. P. And face the consequences. The choice is tiktok agencies. Companies contrktoks is tiktoks. Companies controlled by a foreign adversary like the c. C. P. Will never embrace american also have like freedom of speech, human right the rule of law and a free press. If give the choice, they will always choose the path for more control, more surveillance and more manipulation. And in the case of tiktok, we wouldnt even know it. Today we send a clear message that we wil not tolerate our adversaries weaponizing our freedoms against us. I encourage my colleagues to support this bill and i reserve the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman from washington reserves. The gentleman from kentucky is recognized. Mr. Speaker i know the sponsors of this bill are sincere in their concerns and in their effort t americans. Mr. Massie theyve described the tiktok application as a trojan horse but theres some of us wr intentionally or unintentionally this legislation to ban tiktok is actually a trojan horse. Some of us are concerned that there are First Amendment implications here. Americans have the right to view information. We dont need to be protected by the governmen from information. Some of us just dont want the president picking which apps we can put on our phones or which websites we can visit. We dont thio think its dangerous to give the president that kind of power, to give him the power to decide what americans can see on thei computers, to give him that sort of discretion we also think is days roing. Now, people say that dangerous. Now, people say that this tiktok ban will only apply to tiktok or maybe another company that pops up you just like up just like tiktok but the bill is written so broad could abuse that discretion and include other companies that arent just social Media Companies. And that arent, you know, a some people would believe controlled by foreign adversaries. Again, were giving the president that discretion to decide whether it is controlled by a foreign adversary. There were some people who were legitimately concerned that this was an overly broad bill and they got an exclusion written into the bill that i want to read. It says, the term covered company does not include an entity that operates a website or application whose primary purpose is to allow users to post product reviews business reviews or travel information and reviews. Why is this exception in the bill . Why did somebody feel like they needed this exception if the bill itself only covers social media applications that foreign adversaries are running . These and other questions we hope to answer in the course of this debate and i reserve the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from kentucky reserves. The gentlewoman from washington is recognized. Mrs. Rodgers mr. Speaker i yield 10 minutes to the gentleman from ney, mr. Ploan, and ask unanimous mr. Pallone, and ask unanimous consent that he be permitted to control that time. The speaker pro tempore without objection. Mr. Pallone thank you. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman fm new jersey is recognized. Mr. Pallone mr. Speaker i yield myself three minutes. Mr. Speaker i rise in support of h. R. 7521 the protecting americans frory controlled applications act. Big tech has transformed social media platforms into modern day media compani unfortunately these networks engage in invasive surveillance practices by collecting americans most sensitive personal data. Foreign adversaries also see access to americans data, communication networks, devices and applications as the entry points to disrupt our daily lives and conduct espionage activities. And all of this endangers our National Security interests. We have a long history of restricting our tv and radio airwaves from ownership by foreign governments and individuals due to the National Security concerns that these arrangements pose. Social Media Companies should also face similar scrutiny. After all while technology has evolved, the threats are very much the same. And i also take the concerns raised by the Intelligence Community very seriously. They have asked congress to give them more authority to act and narrowly in narrowly defined situations. I believe this bill will do just that by addressing the ny applications operated by companies controlled by foreign adversaries. While this bill establishes a National Security framework tly to other applications, much of the public attention is focused on tiktok. The combination of tiktoks beijing communistbased nership and the fact that more than 170 million americans use it exacerbates its dangerous its dangers to our country and our privacy. Laws in china allow the Chinese Communist party like tiktok to share data with them, whether the Companies Want to or not. This means that the c. C. P. Hash tiktok to compromise device security, maliciously access americans data promote procommunist propaganda and undermine interests. This is extremely troubling. Beijing, china should not have the control over americans that tiktok gives them. It is my hope that ion will force divestment of tiktok so that americans will be able to continue using this platform without the risk that its being operated and controlled by beijing, china. However, even if tiktok is divested china and other foreign adversaries will still be able to acquire vast amounts of americans data, thats because we place no restrictions on data brokers who sell data to them and that must stop as well. I look forward to the house considering next week legislation that i introduced with chair rogers that would chair rodgers that would stop this from happening. We need to hold bh accountable for transforming the information superhighway into a superspreader of harmful harmful content, invasive surveillance practices and addictive an features, all with the goal of collecting more data. We must enact a comprehensive data privacy bill so that we finally give a is used and collected. So i want to thank representative krishnamoorthi. And i urge my colleagues to support h. R. 7521 and i reserve the balance of myspeaker pro tempore the gentleman from new jersey reserves. The gentlewoman from washington is recognized. Mrs. Rodgers thank you, mr. Speaker. I yield a minute and a hf to the gentleman from wisconsin mr. Gallagher. Mr. Gallagher thank you. Tiktok is a threat to our National Security because it is owned by a company which does the bidding of the chinese communityist party. We know this because their leadership says so and because chinese law requires it. This bill therefore f tiktok to break up with the Chinese Communist party. It does not apply to american companies. It onlyt to the control of foreign adversaries defined by congress. It says nothing about election interference and cannot be turned against any American Social media platform. It does not impact websites in general. The only impacted sites are those associated with foreign adversary apps such as tiktok. Com. It can never be used to penalize individuals. The text explicitlyd it cannot, cannot be used to sensor speech, it takes no position at all on the content of speech, only foreign adversary control. Foreign adversary control of what is becoming the dominant news for americans under 30. This is a commonsense measure to protect our National Security. I urge my colleagues to supportis critical bipartisan legislation. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman reserves. From washington. Ill you know recognize ill recognize the gentleman from new jersey. Mr. Pallone thank you, mr. Speaker. I yield three minutes now to the gentleman from illinois, the democratic sponsor of the bill. Mr. Krishnamoorthi thank you chair pallone. Thank you Mike Gallagher my partner on this bill. Thank you to Cathy Mcmorris rodgers. Thank you to all the members of the select committee. First, this bill is not a ban and its not about tiktok. Its about bite dance. Bite dance is a 100 owner of tiktok. They are controlled by the Chinese Communist party. Er he has been charged with making he has been chaed with making sure that tiktok and all products of bytedance have political direction. This ensures that bytedance divest itself of the vast majority of ownership of tiktok. Our index is our intention is foriktok to continue to operate but not underhe control of the Chinese Communist party. Without precedent. When the app grindr was acquired by a Chinese Company and the unids government determined that Sensitive Data of lgbtq members of the military and u. S. Government officials got into the hands of the Chinese Communist party they required dwieftment divestment. This happened quickly. Why . Because it was a very valuable social Media Company. The same is true with regard to tiktok and there will be no disruption to users just as there was with grindr. Third point. Unfortunately when tiktok has appeared before congress, whether its bmp the before the house energy and Commerce Committee or otherwise it has not been candid, my friends. It has not been candid. First, tiktok said its data is not accessible to chinabased bytedance employees. False. Chinabased employees routinely access this data, even unbeknownst to employees of tiktok u. S. A. In addition, tiktok said its data will not be weaponized and has not been weaponized against american citizens. Again, false. Published reports have shown that tiktok data, geolocation data has been used journalists who reported on problems with chinesebased employees having access to american user data. Finally last week under the leadership of their coman and the Ranking Member they brought up for consideration our bill before the house energy and Commerce Committee. On the morningt vote, tiktok delivered a push notification and a popup to thousands of users across the country. They used geolocation data targeting minor children to then force them to call congressional offices in order to continue using the app. And in doing so, these children called and they asked the question what is congress and what is a congressman . This influence campaign illustrates the need for this bill. Thank you and i yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields. The gentleman from new jersey reserves. Now ill recognize the gentleman from kentucky. Mr. Massie i recognize data privacy champion, mr. Warren davidson from ohio, for three minutes. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from ohio is recognized. Ms. Davids i thank mr. Davidson i thank the gentleman for yielding time. The gentleman from new jersey who isnt actually opposed to the bill seems to have identified the real issue which is data privacy. I think its important that we solve the correct problem. Our problem is all these companies, social mediaings otherwise media otherwise your car your phone you name it its surveillance. The spying that goes on with american citizens does need to be addressed and it should be addressed by the energy and Commerce Committee. Ive long pleaded with members of both sides of the aisle to pass h. R. 4, to reclaim the privacy rights that are so deeply infringed in our country. And by avoiding that problem we take away the energy and momentum to address the root issue. Frankly the people sponsoring this bill today claim that the real issue is ownership. But who owns this company . Its not 100 owned bywned by investors including american investors. 20 are owned by the founders and 20 are owned by employees over 7,000 employees. The companys headquarters is not in china its in singapore and the american user data isnt housed in china its housed in texas. Controlled by a database owned by oracle. The administration seems to believe they can ban the export ofa, not just on tiktok, but on all platforms, because they just issued an executive order banning the export. Now, i wish this was the bill that ms. Jayapal and i have sponsored that we were moving, the Fourth Amendments not for sale past judiciary but stopping foreigners from buying it would also address the privacy concerns. C if we think we can address the privacy concerns, whats left to address . Content moderation. Remember elon musk bought the crime scene at twitter. It was a conspiracy theory. These algorithm and canceling people. You guys are crazy. When musk bought twitter, he kept it operating with fewer ploy lot of the employees were trying to shape content information. Which algorithms were used how it promotes certain people and filters others. What youre saying here is if youre not fully engaged with americas threeleer in content moderation we plan to tiktok you. This bill isnt limited to tiktok. Its a coerc power that applied to others. Like telegram, tour, things that provide privacy would be targeted by this bill. Rhaps tether, one of the things they cant control as a monetary system. When you look at companies if it enables one user to see content that isnt approved its subject it a 500 fine per user. 500 million. 30 seconds . This is meant to be able to take out anything, including its one user see it is. It could target an infinite number of companies but not places. So for that i do applaud the work that was done to back off from the dystopian restrict act but this is essentially a down payment on the restrict act. The restrict act i encourage everyone to look it up. This is what the administration really wanted to do. What members of congress, both sides of the aisle wanted to do is to create a bigger surveillance state. Thats what the Intel Committee wants to do. The speaker pro tempore the gentlemans time has expired. Mr. Davidson we have to shrink it and protect Fourth Amendment right to privacy. I yield. Mr. Massie reserve. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from kentucky reserves. Now the gentlewoman from washington. Mrs. Rodgers thank you, mr. Speaker. It is not true that this is a down payment on a restrict act. Not interested in the restrict act. With that i yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from ohio, mr. Latta. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman is recognized. Mr. Latta i thank the gentlewoman for yielding. The c. E. O. Of tiktok appeared before the energy and Commerce Committee and admitted to questioning that byte dance has access to u. S. Data. This should be an alarm to every tiktok user. No reason why the Chinese Communist party s app that can access information on a users phone. Because companies are owned or linked to the Chinese Communist party are forceed to comply with their laws beetdance and the employ bytedance are taking orders from the communist regime. If bytedance is the ownership of tiktok, tiktok will be available to its u. S. Users. I urge all my colleagues to support this legislation. I yield back the balance of my time. Mrs. Rodgers reserve. The speaker pro tempore the gentlelady reserves. I recognize the gentleman from new jersey. Mr. Pallone i yield two minutes to the speaker emeritus, ms. Pelosi. The speaker pro tempore the gentlec2man is recogni ms. Pelosi thank you very much, mr. Speaker. I thank the gentleman for yielding and for his leadership on this very important issue. I thank the chairwoman of the energy and Commerce Committee associate myself with her remarks as well as with mr. Pallones. I krishnamoorthi and mr. Gallagher, chairman gallagher of the select committee on china for their great leadership. Bringing this legislation forward to the committee of jurisdiction. Legislative jurisdiction. I have a few points to make. Its interesting to hear respectful debate. First of all, this is not a ban on tiktok. Im a grandmother of teenagers i understand you a educational val a. Communication value, the Business Value for some businesses. This is not an attempt to ban tiktok its an attempt to make tiktok better. Tictactoe, a winner. Of china have come