Tangle - A "TikTok ban" is moving forward.

Starting point is 00:00:00 Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at flucellvax.ca.

Starting point is 00:01:00 From executive producer Isaac Saul, this is Tangle. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening, and welcome to the Tangle podcast, a place we get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking, and a little bit of my take. I'm your host, Isaac Saul, and on today's episode, we're going to be talking about a potential TikTok ban, which is getting some serious momentum in Congress. It's a pretty big story. I think there's a lot of meat on the bone. I'm excited to jump in. Before we do, though, a quick reminder. We just released a few dozen more tickets to our event in New York City. The event sold out. Super pumped about that. We reached out to the venue. I had friends and family who had not gotten tickets yet,

Starting point is 00:01:56 so it happened a little bit quicker than I was expecting it to. And they released some more tickets for us. I don't really totally understand how that stuff works. It feels weird to have a sellout and then be like, actually, we have more tickets, but we have more tickets. And I want to sell it out again. So if you have not gotten a ticket yet and you want to come to the event in New York City on April 17th, it's a Wednesday night. Now is a great time to get that ticket.

Starting point is 00:02:20 We have so far already booked Josh Hammer from Newsweek and Katrina Vanden Heuvel from The Nation to Media Bigwigs right now, for real. I mean, their stuff is read by a lot of people. And I think it's going to be a really interesting discussion, even if we're just them. But we do have a third guest coming soon, I hope. And yeah, there'll be news there. So get your ticket before that news comes. All right, with that out of the way, we're going to jump in with some quick hits.

Starting point is 00:02:56 First up, Robert Herr, the special counsel who spurred controversy with comments about President Biden's memory, left the Justice Department, and will testify before Congress today as a private citizen. Number two, President Biden proposed a $7.3 trillion budget for the fiscal year 2025, seeking to cut housing and health care costs while raising taxes on high-income earners. Budget proposals are non-binding and rarely enacted, as they are written. Number three, former President Donald Trump asked to delay his first criminal trial in New York involving payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels until after the Supreme Court case on the question of his immunity is heard.

Starting point is 00:03:38 Number four, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge announced that she will resign. And number five, students and teachers will be allowed to speak freely about sexual orientation and gender identity in Florida classrooms, provided their discussion is not a part of classroom instruction after a settlement between Florida education officials and civil rights attorneys. The social media giant under attack in Washington. The House set to vote this week on a bill designed to force TikTok's Chinese parent company to sell off its stake or face a possible ban here in the U.S. Lawmakers are citing national security concerns for the reason behind the proposed ban,

Starting point is 00:04:27 all while TikTok denies claims that the Chinese government could access user data. This is what lawmakers are saying concerns a national security issue. They worry that the Chinese parent company ByteDance has access and is perhaps giving data from TikTok to the Chinese government. Those are allegations that TikTok denies. They say that if they follow through on this nationwide ban, that it would destroy the livelihoods of all these creators that have built reputations off of this app. On Thursday, a ban that could make TikTok unavailable in the United States advanced

Starting point is 00:05:00 in Congress, with a committee voting unanimously to bring it up for a full vote. The bill, called Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, could force the company to be sold or face prohibitions in the U.S. TikTok, the popular video streaming app, is owned by the China-based company ByteDance. It is one of the most widely used apps in the United States, with an estimated 150 million monthly users. However, national security officials and lawmakers have warned that China's government can access user data through the app and use it to spy on Americans, further warning that Chinese government is already putting thumbs on the scale of what content gets promoted on the app.

Starting point is 00:05:41 Some members of Congress have been pushing for a ban since last year, and the White House directed government agencies to delete the app from federal devices last year. The latest piece of legislation on TikTok is a 12-page bill that just got voted out of committee unanimously with a 50-0 bipartisan vote. The bill has a two-pronged approach, first prohibiting TikTok and other apps by DanceDance controls from being made available to users in the United States unless the company divests from them. Then it creates a process to let the executive branch prohibit access to an app owned by a foreign adversary if the government believes it poses a threat to national security. In effect, the bill would force

Starting point is 00:06:20 ByteDance to either sell TikTok before a six-month deadline or be banned from the U.S. app stores and web hosting services. Any such bill would likely face legal challenges, and TikTok has already sued the Trump administration over its attempt to ban TikTok in 2020. However, odds of the bill passing are looking increasingly strong. House Speaker Mike Johnson, the Republican from Louisiana, said he supports the bill, and the White House reportedly provided technical support in the drafting of the legislation. President Joe Biden endorsed it on Monday. Former President Donald Trump, who had previously endorsed the TikTok ban, criticized the bill over the weekend. His criticism came after a meeting with a major TikTok shareholder who some speculated he was courting for campaign donations.

Starting point is 00:07:06 TikTok shareholder who some speculated he was courting for campaign donations. TikTok forcefully denounced the bill, saying it would strip 170 million Americans of their constitutional right to free expression and damage millions of businesses, deny artists an audience, and destroy the livelihoods of countless creators across the country. The company also set up a push notification for users, urging them to contact lawmakers and vote against the bill. You can find our previous coverage of attempts to ban TikTok with a link in today's episode description. Today, we're going to share some arguments from the right and the left about the legislation, then my take. We'll be right back after this quick commercial break. First up, we'll start with what the right is saying. The right is mixed on the bill, but most condemn the tactics TikTok has employed to lobby against it. Some say banning the app

Starting point is 00:08:01 would be a clear First Amendment violation. Others call on Congress to seize the opportunity and take meaningful action against TikTok. In National Review, Noah Rothman wrote that TikTok holds America hostage. There's nothing remarkable about a commercial interest resisting the prospect of congressional regulation by using its influence to lean on legislators. For all the populist hostility toward the practice, lobbying is a constitutionally protected activity for good reason, Rothman said. But the way in which the Chinese-owned social media app TikTok went about trying to convince lawmakers to leave it alone was unique. It sicked its youthful users on Washington in a campaign of

Starting point is 00:08:41 intimidation and emotional blackmail, confirming that the air of menace the app has cultivated for itself is no accident. It would seem that TikTok only has one mode, and it is not nimble enough to deviate from the disastrous course on which it has set itself, Rothman wrote. The panic induced by bipartisan legislation that threatens China's control over the application has exposed the commercial incentives at the root of this campaign. There's a lot of money at stake in this venture, an incentive to which Democrats and Republicans alike are duly sensitive. The starkness of the choice for them has, however, never been clearer. In Reason, Elizabeth Nolan Brown said, Dear Government, stop trying to make TikTok bans happen. We went here with Trump,

Starting point is 00:09:26 who tried to ban TikTok via executive order in 2020. The court said no, and the Biden administration rescinded the order. We went here with Montana, which passed the TikTok banning law last year. The court said no, at least preliminarily, though Montana is appealing. We went here with multiple bills, including one in 2022 from Florida Republican Senator Marco Rubio and one in 2023 from Virginia Democratic Senator Mark Warner, Brown said. Now, here we are again. The proposed ban would choke off Americans' access to a popular media platform based on vague allegations of wrongdoing in a move that offends both the First Amendment and due process,

Starting point is 00:10:05 Brown added. The measure would obviously be ripe for abuse. For example, say another app like TikTok comes along and it's proving a really useful campaigning tool for third-party and independent candidates. A Republican or Democratic president could then block access to it. That's the kind of stuff Russia and China do. It is no place in the United States. In The Federalist, Nathan Lemer argued that Congress must hold firm against TikTok's legion of lobbyists. Unlike previous efforts to rein in TikTok, this has a real chance of success. The proposal has the right balance of mitigating real harm without setting off tripwires that stalled previous attempts. Instead of banning the app, it sets a 180-day deadline for TikTok to be divested from control by the foreign adversary, Leamer said. It's narrowly

Starting point is 00:10:51 written to address the specific concerns about TikTok and similar entities that are controlled by foreign adversaries. It will be tempting for many politicians to give in to the mounting pressure and change their tune on this bill. The next few weeks will be critical for the proposal's future, Lemur said. As the lobbying game intensifies, pressure falls on members in both chambers to stay focused and move this legislation toward passage. Now is the time for Congress to stand firm against these mounting external pressures, prioritizing the security and sovereignty of Americans in the digital age. All right, that is it for the rightist saying, which brings us to what the left is saying. The left is also mixed on the bill, with some saying TikTok is a clear national security threat.

Starting point is 00:11:45 Others argue that TikTok's influence is no worse than other U.S.-based social media platforms. Another contingent says an outright ban would amount to censorship. In no opinion, Noah Smith said TikTok is really bad and should be forced to sell. A lot of people call this a TikTok ban, but in fact it's not. The bill in Congress would simply force TikTok's corporate ownership to change. The video service itself, with all its silly dance videos and bad news analysis, would remain. But it's notable that to TikTok's current leadership, a change of ownership might as well be the same as a ban, Smith wrote. Why are both TikTok's current management and CCP mouthpieces so desperate to prevent a sale. There's only

Starting point is 00:12:25 one answer that makes sense. Chinese authorities believe that TikTok is an important tool for influencing public opinion in the United States. The problem here isn't that the news young Americans get on TikTok is bad. Much of it certainly is bad, but that's more of a problem with news consumers than with the app. The problem is that the news is subtly and invisibly controlled by a foreign adversary government, Smith said. TikTok's desperate pressure campaign against the divestiture bill backfired precisely because it seemed to promote a clear demonstration of the app's power. If TikTok could instantly convert its users into lobbyists against that bill, why couldn't it do the exact same thing in the case of a war between China and the U.S.? In Bloomberg, Karishma Vaswani suggested America's TikTok addiction isn't China's fault. Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows

Starting point is 00:13:19 the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 cases. What can you do this flu season? Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about getting a flu shot. Consider FluCellVax Quad and help

Starting point is 00:13:55 protect yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at flucellvax.ca. There are a few things that can get both the American left and right as exercised as the idea that a foreign nation is perverting the minds of their young. When that country is China, the full force of the U.S. political system weighs in, Vaswani said. While there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about the impact of a foreign-owned social media platform beloved by so many young Americans, it's time for a little honesty and self-reflection. The U.S. TikTok addiction isn't just a Chinese

Starting point is 00:14:40 problem. Homegrown tech has failed to keep up with the kind of innovation that Chinese firms have developed. The reality is that all of these platforms collect data on us and hold huge sway over our hearts and minds. We give our power over to them the minute we switch on our phones and click on the icons. We live in their world, whether it's TikTok or YouTube or Instagram, and they take over our ability to see the world in a clear-eyed, rational fashion. This is not exclusively a TikTok issue, but because it's so ubiquitous and, more importantly, Chinese-owned, it has become a target. In the Boston Globe, Marcela Garcia wrote in stark defense of TikTok. At first glance, the legislation may seem sensible, but it also looks like censorship, Garcia said. Already, millions of American TikTok

Starting point is 00:15:25 creators and consumers have joined legal experts and civil liberties advocates to explain all the reasons why a TikTok ban would be detrimental. An outright prohibition raises First Amendment concerns and is unconstitutional, while doing little to address the vast data and privacy vulnerabilities found in other corners of the internet. TikTok and other social media apps need regulation, but there are better ways, such as passing the American Data Privacy and Protection Act, that would restrict how companies collect user data and a proposal by the company itself that would allow its data operations to be overseen by a federal committee, among other things. Never mind that lawmakers who favor a TikTok ban haven't offered solid

Starting point is 00:16:05 evidence that the Chinese government uses TikTok to spy on Americans. All right, that is it for the left and the right are saying, which brings us to my take. what the left and the right are saying, which brings us to my take. Let's start with something I think is simple. There are real risks posed by TikTok. I don't think the allegations or dangers are somehow vague, as Elizabeth Nolan Brown contends under what the right is saying. We know that TikTok is monitored and tracked journalists who report critically on the app. We know there are laws in China that can compel ByteDance to hand over user data to the Chinese government upon request, and we know the system they have now for protecting U.S. data is porous. We know that the app's filters have been used to promote China's political positions. We have a lot of circumstantial evidence, like a study that is

Starting point is 00:17:00 linked to in today's episode description, showing that TikTok can and does manipulate its algorithm to steer Americans away from topics sensitive to the CCP. And we have leaked documents showing that TikTok instructs its moderators to censor videos that mention Tiananmen Square, Tibetan independence, or the banned religious group Falun Gong. So, the threat of 150 million U.S. users, including a huge chunk of young Americans, getting influenced by this app is not imaginary. There are any number of ways that this could pose a long-term threat to Americans, either through sheer Chinese propaganda on the app, or through more insidious and direct issues, like decades of a future lawmaker's data being accessible to a foreign government. All this is to say I don't

Starting point is 00:17:45 think the quote-unquote threat isn't real, or every social media app has risks is a strong argument against forcing a TikTok sale. I think the threat is real, and I think it is fairly unique to TikTok, and I think it's more dangerous than the kind of stuff we see on Twitter or Instagram. But I still don't support a TikTok ban. The biggest reason I think legislating a TikTok sale like this opens up a whole new can of worms is that it sets a dangerous precedent about the power we are giving the federal government. One of the reasons our government officials worry about a government like China's having so much sway and influence with American voters is that it can act in repressive,

Starting point is 00:18:30 censorious ways. But if our government starts forcing the sale of apps it deems a threat, like TikTok, or bans them from app stores when they don't sell, it'd be acting in the very same censorious and repressive ways. It isn't hard to imagine the numerous conflicts of interest and dangerous situations that could arise. Former President Donald Trump, for instance, has his own social media platform. What if he were re-elected and decided he didn't want Truth Social's competitor, X slash Twitter, to operate freely in the U.S. anymore? How hard would it be for him to convince a large swath of Republicans that X spreads disinformation and Americans' data isn't secure? X isn't currently owned by a foreign adversary, but that can of worms would be open. As I wrote last year, part of what makes the U.S. different from China is that we don't bifurcate the information that can exist inside our country from what exists

Starting point is 00:19:16 outside of it. TikTok, for instance, doesn't even exist in China. A much more heavily censored version of it does. This creates risks for the U.S., but it's also a system that allows private companies to thrive and the free exchange of good and bad ideas to flourish. I prefer that system to the one this bill could lead to. People using TikTok should understand the risks this app poses. The federal government isn't banning employees from downloading the app on government devices for show, nor is there bipartisan consensus on this bill because Democrats and Republicans are suddenly anti-capitalism. This is not xenophobia or drumming up support for military funding. Lawmakers simply understand there are unique and legitimately dangerous aspects about TikTok.

Starting point is 00:19:59 Now, would a sale to a U.S. company be a good outcome here? Yes, it would. But the moment that sale is forced with the heavy-handedness of direct federal government legislation, a whole new cascade of issues is now at our feet. Those issues are exactly why such legislation is not likely to survive legal challenges, and it's to say nothing of the reality that any ban of the app would do legitimate damage to thousands of creators and businesses who are doing perfectly innocent things on the app. In short, I don't have a great solution, except raising more awareness about the risks TikTok poses. But I can spot a bad solution, one that creates more problems than it fixes when I see it. And I think a forced sale via legislation is one such bad solution. We'll be right back after this quick break. All right, that is it for my take, which brings us to your questions answered.

Starting point is 00:20:59 This one's from Eric in Orlando, Florida. Eric said, can we believe the polls? After 2016, 2020, and 2022, I'm doubtful opinion polls can be trusted within their margin of error. Maybe that's just a coping device, but I think they leave a lot of questions unanswered while pretending to be authoritative. All right, Eric, this is a good question. It is a kind of cyclical question, too, as it seems that every time we approach a major election, it comes up again. After 2016, we were wondering how and why polls seemed biased to underrepresent Trump's support. In 2020, the polls were much more of a mixed bag, but accuracy problems persisted. Then in 2022, it seemed like that the polls were biased the

Starting point is 00:21:41 other way because of everything from poorly worded questions to false assumptions about voter turnout. However, it's important not to overanalyze trends. There were some people who were more right than wrong in 2022, such as the guru of Nevada politics, John Ralston, and the Democratic strategist, Simon Rosenberg, who was right the whole time. It's also important to not misremember trends. Even though midterm polls did overstate Republican support, the story coming out of the 2022 midterms was that the polls right before the midterms were actually pretty good. According to polling legend Nate Silver of Five Thirty-Eight, the polls were historically accurate. So I actually feel pretty safe trusting opinion polls within their margin of error with three big caveats.

Starting point is 00:22:26 You've got to stay within those margins of error. Races that are too close to call are often, well, too close to call. You can't judge springtime polls for elections decided in the fall, and you can't translate national polling to swing states that will decide the election. Now's the time to make observations about voter support, the importance of different issues, and the relative strengths of every candidate. The time to draw some conclusions and make some confident predictions based on polling is in October and maybe even November. So I would advise anyone trying to understand the political landscape to keep the number of polls you read broad, but to keep what you're willing to learn narrow.

Starting point is 00:23:10 As we said on Monday, new polls show Biden pulling ahead of Trump nationally, but that can only tell you where people are leaning now that it's a two-candidate race. Once we see those two candidates get pitted directly against each other and in specific states, the polls will change. And if those polls show us something significant, then I think it's fair to trust what they're showing us is real. All right, that is it for our reader question today, which brings us to our under-the-radar section. Progressive groups are launching a reject-APAC effort as divides within the Democratic Party over Israel grow. A coalition of two dozen progressive groups launched a seven-figure ad

Starting point is 00:23:45 spend to defend progressive Democrats who have criticized Israel's military offensive in Gaza and are now facing negative ads funded by AIPAC, or the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee. The progressive coalition opposing AIPAC is also organizing demonstrations to call for a ceasefire in Gaza and is demanding new conditions on U.S. military support for Israel. ABC News has the story, and there's a link to it in today's episode description. All right, next up is the numbers section. The number of countries with a full or partial ban on TikTok as of April 2023 is now 16. The percentage of Republicans who said they would support the U.S. government banning TikTok in a March 2023 survey by Pew Research was 60%. The percentage of Republicans who said they would support the U.S. government banning TikTok in a follow-up

Starting point is 00:24:35 survey in September-October 2023 was just 50%. The percentage of Democrats who said they would support the U.S. government banning TikTok in March of 2023 was 43%. And the percentage of Democrats who said they would support the U.S. government banning TikTok in a follow-up September poll was 29%. The percentage increase in social media users who say they regularly get news from TikTok between 2020 and 2023 is 21%. And the percentage decrease in social media users who say they regularly get news from Facebook between 2020 and 2023 is 11%. All right, and last but not least, our have a nice day section. A new 400-page report from the World Health Organization describes the 2020s as the platinum decade for the current trend of improvements in poor and

Starting point is 00:25:25 developing countries in Southeast Asia. One of the main findings of the report were the decreases in mortality from communicable diseases like polio and measles. Every country in the region except India has now eliminated trachoma, an eye infection that causes blindness, although the World Health Organization believes India may have done so by the end of 2023. Since 2010, maternal mortality rates decreased by 41%, and deaths from malaria decreased from 2.5 per 100,000 to 0.5. The World Health Organization projects deaths from malaria could reach 0.1 per 100,000 by the end of the decade. The Progress Network has the story, and there's a link to it in today's episode description. All right, everybody, that is it for today's podcast.

Starting point is 00:26:16 As always, if you want to support our work, you can go to readtangle.com and become a member. And we'll be right back here same time tomorrow. Have a good one. Peace. Our podcast is written by me, Isaac Saul and edited and engineered by John Wall. The script is edited by our managing editor,

Starting point is 00:26:40 Ari Weitzman, Will Kabak, Bailey Saul, and Sean Brady. The logo for our podcast was designed by Magdalena Bokova, who is also our social media manager. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet75. And if you're looking for more from Tangle, please go to readtangle.com and check out our website. We'll see you next time. procedural, who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history,

Starting point is 00:27:30 and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 cases. What can you do this flu season? Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about getting a flu shot. Thank you.

Tangle - A "TikTok ban" is moving forward.

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