One day after the House overwhelmingly passed legislation that could ban TikTok, former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he is putting together an investor group to try to buy the popular video sharing platform.
“I think the legislation should pass, and I think it should be sold,” Mnuchin told CNBC Thursday morning. “It’s a great business, and I’m going to put together a group to buy TikTok.”
While he did not say who he has been speaking with, Mnuchin believes TikTok should be “owned by U.S. businesses.”
“There’s no way the Chinese would ever let a U.S. company own something like this in China,” he added.
"It's a great business and I'm going to put together a group to buy TikTok," says Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. "The issue is all about the technology. This needs to be controlled by U.S. businesses." pic.twitter.com/6yoLoL5bay
— Squawk Box (@SquawkCNBC) March 14, 2024
The Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, which passed easily in the House, 352-65, would force TikTok’s parent company, Chinese-owned ByteDance, to divest or be banned from U.S. app stores and web hosting services. But its future in the Senate is uncertain.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), for example, has argued the bill is "inconsistent" with the First Amendment, while others, like Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), say "the bill itself is content neutral."
“Chinese companies controlled by the Chinese Communist Party do not have a constitutional right to operate in the United States," Rubio told Townhall in an emailed statement. "Americans can say anything they want on TikTok or any other social-media app. The only restriction is that the Chinese Communist Party can no longer control the app.”
President Biden has said he would sign the bill if its reaches his desk, but former President Trump, once a major proponent of banning the app, has recently changed his tune.
“There’s a lot of good and a lot of bad with TikTok," Trump told CNBC on Monday. "But the thing I don’t like is, without TikTok you can make Facebook bigger. And I consider Facebook to be an enemy of the people, along with the media."
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