A Hill Worth Dying On
The TikTok ban must stand if America is to triumph over Chinese totalitarianism.
“Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.”
That famous line, spoken by Al Pacino’s Michael Corleone in The Godfather Part III, is perhaps one of the only positive aspects of that wildly disappointing film. (Sofia Coppola as an actress? Seriously?) It is a perfect quote to capture a reality that often strikes: the nasty recurrence of a problem thought to be past. Reader, I start with this quote because that particular reality has struck your humble correspondent. A subject I had hoped was dead and buried reared its ugly head once more, necessitating an updated response, as it is of the utmost importance. I’m talking about the Chinese social media app/spyware/propaganda tool known as TikTok.
This malign app has been the bane of my existence as a China hawk for about 5 years now. I have written several thousand words about it and investigated the issue thoroughly. The app is a Chinese Communist Party-controlled data collection and social engineering project intended to exert a malignant influence over American behavior now and into the future. If you want the full scope of the problem with TikTok, give these three pieces a read: The Case Against TikTok, Why a TikTok Ban is Necessary, and Tick-Tock for TikTok.
The case in short is that the parent company of TikTok, ByteDance, is a Chinese corporation that is fully subject to the CCP’s national security laws, requiring it to hand all user data it collects over to the Chinese government. The company is also deeply interwound with the Party, as are most major Chinese businesses, rendering it nigh inseparable from the CCP itself. TikTok collects massive troves of user data from Americans of all ages – as the app has been promoted as a youth-centric video-sharing social network, it is heavily biased towards the generations of Americans that will exert a dominant influence over the coming decades. That data, including audio and video capture, location data, and all communications data on a device, is hoovered up by the CCP and stored for ready access in China. Besides this espionage capability – already proven to have been used by Beijing to surreptitiously record the conversations of critical journalists – TikTok is a massive propaganda weapon pointed at the heart of American politics. Its algorithm, which ByteDance claims must remain in Chinese hands (curious, that), pushes divisive social politics, radical political content, anti-American ideology, and rank antisemitism, while simultaneously censoring anything remotely critical of the government in Beijing. The app has no place in American society given these indisputable facts. Nevertheless, it has persisted.
Until, that is, January 19, 2025. On that date, a bipartisan law which effectively banned TikTok passed into full effect, forcing the removal of the app from major app stores and rendering it largely unusable. TikTok, instead of being forced offline, halted all US operations that morning. I was somewhat critical of the mechanisms of the law when it was passed, as it forced a full Chinese divestment from TikTok but rewarded ByteDance and the CCP with a massive financial boon in exchange. Still, this process would at least ensure that the greatest harms of the app would be mitigated. Another positive aspect of the law is that it did not exclusively focus on TikTok, but allowed for any foreign adversary-controlled social technology company to be similarly banned. This matters, as so-called TikTok refugees rapidly migrated to an app called RedNote in the US, but Xiaohongshu in China. Translated, that is “Little Red Book.” Yes, reader, the app is quite literally positively referencing Mao in its very name – a bit on the nose.
In this case, TikTok and ByteDance simply refused to go along with the law, instead suing the federal government to get it overturned. This failed miserably, with the Supreme Court unanimously deciding that the law was constitutional and could go into effect, which it did two days later. The law provides for massive user-based penalties for app stores and ByteDance, fines that would rapidly reach the tens of billions of dollars given the number of users on TikTok. Still, had TikTok not chosen to go dark voluntarily, it may not have had to at all. The outgoing Biden administration, on its last full day in office and between bouts of egregious pardons, punted on enforcing this law. But it came into effect regardless. For one glorious day, America was free of the scourge of TikTok. Those of us who had been pushing for this outcome for years rejoiced in the new reality.
Well, at least until the incoming Trump administration rescued TikTok from the jaws of oblivion.
Via an executive order signed by President Trump on his first day in office, the Attorney General was instructed not to enforce the law banning TikTok for an additional 75 days. The relevant text of the executive order is as follows:
“I have the unique constitutional responsibility for the national security of the United States, the conduct of foreign policy, and other vital executive functions. To fulfill those responsibilities, I intend to consult with my advisors, including the heads of relevant departments and agencies on the national security concerns posed by TikTok, and to pursue a resolution that protects national security while saving a platform used by 170 million Americans. My Administration must also review sensitive intelligence related to those concerns and evaluate the sufficiency of mitigation measures TikTok has taken to date.
The unfortunate timing of section 2(a) of the Act — one day before I took office as the 47th President of the United States — interferes with my ability to assess the national security and foreign policy implications of the Act’s prohibitions before they take effect. This timing also interferes with my ability to negotiate a resolution to avoid an abrupt shutdown of the TikTok platform while addressing national security concerns. Accordingly, I am instructing the Attorney General not to take any action to enforce the Act for a period of 75 days from today to allow my Administration an opportunity to determine the appropriate course forward in an orderly way that protects national security while avoiding an abrupt shutdown of a communications platform used by millions of Americans.”
Under this order, TikTok will remain operational in the US for at least the next 75 days and, given the penchant for Trump to double down on his decisions, likely far longer. The president has stated publicly that he wants a 50-50 joint venture between America and TikTok’s Chinese ownership – it is unclear whether he means an American company or the federal government itself – a possibility that is precluded by the law he is now refusing to enforce. He has downplayed the very real harms of the app, saying it is basically just an anodyne video platform beloved by America’s youth. Trump has already signaled a strong willingness to allow the CCP to retain a dangerous degree of control over TikTok, going so far as to invite top Chinese officials to his inauguration and to sit TikTok’s CEO directly on the presidential dais. This is a total 180 from his original position, which was to push for a TikTok ban back in 2020; he was basically the one leading the charge on this key issue during the denouement of his first term. Now, he has reversed field entirely.
This is not surprising given Trump’s highly unprincipled, transactional, and mercurial demeanor. The man is fickle in the extreme, even on crucial national security priorities like this. He most likely changed his mind for a few reasons. First, his teenage son Barron has talked up the app, helping the Trump campaign navigate it relatively successfully during the 2024 campaign. This has led to Trump falsely claiming that he won the youth vote by more than 30 points, which is simply inaccurate. He believes TikTok has a great deal to do with this support and seeks to avoid alienating the people he thinks of as his backers. Finally, his ear (and wallet) was bent by billionaire megadonor Jeff Yass, who has a large stake in TikTok and would be heavily financially damaged if a ban was enacted. Donald Trump desires popularity and fame over everything, which is the deepest reason why he is seeking to extend TikTok’s life and spare it from its well-earned demise.
Of course, the hardcore MAGA lemmings are following their dear leader directly off a cliff. The past weeks have seen a wide variety of pro-Trump pundits and politicians shift their positions on TikTok with the prevailing winds coming from their idol. The total shift without even any sort of hesitation just shows that this movement, purportedly serious about China and dedicated to protecting America from foreign dangers, is merely a cult of personality based around a carnival-barking, meme-coin-creating, thrice-bankrupted grifter who somehow lucked into facing opponents bad enough that he was elected president twice. It is in no way ‘America First’ and these people should never be listened to again on matters of national security.
Furthermore, the executive order sparing the Chinese spy app from its just deserts is problematic not only due to its egregious misunderstanding of what TikTok actually is, but because of its outright lawlessness. In no way whatsoever is President Trump legally allowed to simply repudiate the law that was duly passed by Congress and signed into effect by his predecessor. There is no mechanism in the law as passed that allows the executive to unilaterally refuse to enforce it; the only delaying action included in the law was a 90-day extension that could be granted only if a purchase was in its final stages, but would not be completed before January 19, 2025. That obviously did not happen, as ByteDance never even tried to sell its cash cow before the legal deadline.
Trump’s EO is a blatantly illegal action that abuses his power and usurps the proper role of Congress – the primary branch of American government. It is also a slap in the face to a unanimous Supreme Court. The president is meant to “faithfully execute” the laws passed by Congress, not undermine them and replace them with ideas of his own. This is no different than the illegal action by former president Biden to unilaterally transfer student loan debt, something that Trump fans rightly criticized. But for their man, nothing is off the table. There is simply no limiting principle here, just excuses. In a sane world, these sorts of actions would be guaranteed to lead to impeachment. That world is, unfortunately, not the one in which we reside. Instead, we have a largely toothless Congress and an executive buoyed by a chorus of fawning sycophants.
Supporters of this illegal Trump reprieve argue that an extension is needed to try to find a buyer, as the court challenges were resolved only two days before the law came into effect. This is nonsense. TikTok could have sought and received an injunction on the law’s timing in the courts (it didn’t), it could have arranged a sale contingent on these legal avenues failing (it didn’t), and it could have done something in the five years since a ban was first mooted to actually address the very real security concerns (it didn’t). The Chinese Communist Party should not get an exemption from a law passed with large bipartisan majorities for no reason other than the fact that the product being banned is popular.
Other critics of the ban argue that millions of Americans who have built businesses on TikTok are being unfairly punished and deserve compensation from the federal government for the ban; they similarly say that free speech is under attack. Neither is true. If Americans sought to have a secure business free from potential disruption, they shouldn’t have relied on the Chinese Communist Party to host it. If they seek a more stable source of online income, they have plenty of options that aren’t wholly based on an espionage and propaganda tool of the Chinese government. One may think that a speech argument would appeal to a free speech absolutist like myself, but it falls flat. The government is not stifling anyone’s speech; they are free to post thirst traps and asinine progressive blatherskite on whatever other site or app they so choose. What is happening here is the removal of a foreign enemy from the heart of America’s social media ecosystem. The Chinese government does not have the right to endanger our national security and Americans don’t have the right to assist them in that quest – knowingly or unknowingly. None of that is speech restriction, as the Supreme Court wisely ruled.
These critical arguments against a TikTok ban – one that was duly passed by a Congress that can barely tie its shoes – are total bunk. There is no good reason to allow this Chinese spy app to operate within the United States. TikTok’s own actions prove this to be true: instead of seeking a sale that would’ve potentially netted hundreds of billions of dollars, ByteDance and its CCP masters chose to shut the app down entirely. They would only do that if the goal of TikTok was not profit, but influence. Abandoning a TikTok ban and undermining the rule of law in this country in a fit of populist idiocy – based around a particularly absurd cult of personality centered on a man who can’t even decide on a wife – would be a terrible outcome.
Banning TikTok is such low-hanging fruit that it might as well be a potato at this point. (Yes, I know potatoes are vegetables, but it sounded good.) We actually got a law passed that would do something positive to shore up our national security and now we’re choosing to repudiate it? In what world does that make sense? If we cannot even do the simplest task possible – enforcing a duly-passed bipartisan law banning a foreign adversary-controlled social media app – how the hell are we going to do the hard things that are necessary to defeat our enemies and launch America into the 22nd century stronger than we came into the 21st? How are we going to economically decouple if we can’t ban TikTok? How are we going to defend Taiwan from invasion if we can’t ban TikTok? How can we punish China for its malign actions around the world, not least of which was unleashing a global pandemic that killed tens of millions, if we can’t even ban TikTok?
This is not a display of a strong and powerful America under an assertive new president. It’s a profound display of weakness that echoes the disastrous Biden administration. Failing to take such an easy win against our primary foe would be devastating to our international position, our ability to confront China going forward, and our general credibility as the world hegemon. If we cannot enforce this ban, Beijing will see us as an easy mark that can be bought off by rank flattery and naked praise. It bodes ill for the coming years, as China becomes more aggressive in its expansionist and anti-American plans. If anything, this weakness will signal to China that it can and should operate more assertively, making direct conflict far more likely.
For China hawks, conservatives, or anyone who has a basic understanding of the danger posed by the totalitarian CCP, this should be an issue of utmost importance. Indeed, it is a hill well worth dying on. Because if we cannot do this, what can we do?