Biden signed legislation Wednesday that could ban TikTok in the U.S. while his campaign has embraced the platform and tried to work with influencers. Already struggling to maintain his previous support from younger voters, the president is now facing criticism from some avid users of the app, which researchers have found is a primary news source for a third of Americans under the age of 30.
The Biden campaign defends its approach and rejects the idea that White House policy is contradicting its political efforts.
“We would be silly to write off any place where people are getting information about the president,” said Rob Flaherty, who ran the White House’s Office of Digital Strategy and now is deputy manager of Biden’s reelection campaign.
he Biden campaign says that an increasingly fragmented modern media environment requires it to meet voters where they are and that TikTok is one of many such places where would-be supporters see its content, in addition to platforms like WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.
It has produced its own TikTok content, but also relied on everyday users who interact with the president. That includes a post from a family that ate fries and other fixings from the Cook Out fast food chain when Biden recently visited Raleigh, North Carolina, as well as Coleman’s putting video.
Opponents of TikTok say its ownership by Chinese company ByteDance gives Beijing a dangerous amount of influence over what narratives Americans see as well as potential access to U.S. user data. Chinese national-security laws allow the ruling Communist Party wide latitude over private business, though the U.S. has not made public evidence that the Chinese government has manipulated the app or forced ByteDance to do its bidding.
The law Biden signed Wednesday would force ByteDance to sell the app to a U.S. company within a year or face a national ban. ByteDance has argued the law violates the First Amendment and promised to sue.
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