House Passes Bill That Could Ban TikTok in the US | China In Focus

Welcome to China In Focus, I'm Tiffany Meyer. Our top story. TikTok and its potential malign influence is in the spotlight. Lawmakers fearing a communist Chinese Trojan horse. More on a just-passed house bill that could see it banned. The Chinese ambassador facing heavy criticism from Harvard students during a speech at the institution. Protesters heard accusing Beijing of multiple human rights violations across various regions and groups in China and nearby. A major drug bust in Maine. A man born in China is accused of transforming a house into a high-tech marijuana grow. And five individuals arrested in Germany and the UK charged as spies for China. Police say they were found stealing technology and intelligence for the Chinese Communist Party. TikTok's future hanging in the balance. The house passed a bill that would force the app to either divest from its Chinese owner or face a ban in the U.S. A similar bill stalled in the Senate last month, but this time the ban is more likely to go through. Daniel Monaghan has the details. TikTok is owned by Chinese parent company ByteDance. The bill passed Saturday would give the social media company 270 days to find a new owner. Lawmakers fear TikTok could be deployed as a tool of the Chinese Communist Party, which could force the company to turn over user data. Another concern is that the CCP could use the company as a Trojan horse, boosting TikTok content favorable to its interests. Senator Mark Warner said that 170 million Americans use TikTok a day, with many young people getting their news there. Speaking on CBS. The idea that we would give the Communist Party this much of a propaganda tool, as well as the ability to scrape 170 million Americans' personal data. House Republicans attached the TikTok bill to funding for Ukrainian military equipment and Israeli missile defense. That puts the pressure on Senate lawmakers to consider the whole package in a single up-or-down vote. Policy analysts expect the Senate to take up the aid package quickly, giving it high odds of passage. President Biden has previously said he would sign the TikTok legislation if it reached his desk. TikTok has vocally opposed the bill, for weeks waging an intense lobbying campaign to defeat the legislation. It argues it violates users' First Amendment rights. The social media company has spent $5 million on TV ads opposing the bill since mid-March and is threatening to go to court if it passes. TikTok has encouraged its users to contact Congress, and some lawmakers have received profanity-laced calls. California Representative Ro Khanna, a Democrat, voted against the legislation. He said he thinks there could have been less restrictive ways to go after the company that wouldn't result in a total ban. A $95 billion foreign aid package passed the House Saturday. Eight percent of that money would go toward countering China, while the rest is marked for Ukraine and Israel. The Senate is expected to pass it as soon as Tuesday. President Biden has promised to sign the bill. Ukraine would get the lion's share, $60 billion, to help fight Russia. We appreciate every manifestation of support for our state and independence, our people and our lives, which Russia wants to bury in ruins. America has shown its leadership from the first days of this war. Israel comes in second, getting over $26 billion. The package comes after Iran fired hundreds of rockets and drones at Israel. Over $8 billion would focus on safeguarding the Indo-Pacific region against the Chinese regime's rising threat. The money would help the U.S. develop submarines, support Taiwan's defenses, and bolster U.S. military capabilities in the region. Taiwan is under increasing pressure of a potential Chinese invasion. Beijing sent 14 warplanes near the island over the weekend. Taipei said it would discuss with Washington how best to use the funding. The Chinese regime sees Taiwan as part of China, despite never having ruled it. Besides the money, the massive foreign aid package would impose sanctions on Iran, China and Russia. It would also force social media app TikTok to separate from its Chinese parent company or get banned from U.S. app stores. Plus, the package cracks down on fentanyl trafficking. House Speaker Mike Johnson's job is at risk for advancing this aid package. Some GOP lawmakers are not happy about him giving more aid to Ukraine. Congressmember Marjorie Taylor Greene threatened on Sunday to oust Johnson if he doesn't resign. She's got enough votes to get rid of Johnson if Democrats don't come to his aid. For a deeper discussion on the renewed House bill on TikTok and the passage of a key foreign aid package, we sat down with General David Stilwell. He's the former Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs. General Stilwell, thank you so much for joining us. Great to have you back on the show. Always a pleasure. Now, the House has voted to approve $95 million billion in foreign aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan in the Indo-Pacific. There was another bill, a national security bill, that would force TikTok's Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to sell. Now, what do you make of this combining, if you will, of foreign aid plus the TikTok bill? The great thing about our system and about our Congress is that it's deliberate. It's slow. We don't make any, like, sudden move, which is as painful as it can be with things like TikTok. It really is the right answer. It doesn't have to happen right away. We need to approach it in a very thoughtful way. We're not wanting to kill TikTok. You in the U.S. who like it, you can use it. We're just going to get the nefarious hand of the Chinese Communist Party out of our open media system. On the flip side, right, Forbes is noting it is unlikely TikTok or the Chinese regime would agree to selling it. There's also talks of legal challenges. What do you make of all of that? Where do you see this going? They're using our Twitter to tell American people that you need to call your representatives and tell them that if, and they're giving them the script to it, saying, if you ban TikTok, I will commit suicide. I mean, these are well planned. They definitely understand our system well, and they're using our system against us. Meanwhile, we're doing not a thing in reverse. The disparity between how much access they have in our system, how much they abuse it, and how little access we have defines the information warfare. You were talking about Kerry Gershenik's political warfare. That's exactly what they're doing. They're taking, this is full advantage. This is, they have unfettered advantage here and they're taking, you know, they're using it smartly. The solution is also simple as we stop allowing them direct access to our system. It's not censorship. It's defense. Why does the Chinese regime or ByteDance not want to sell TikTok? What is it giving the Chinese regime? It gives them direct access to the American people. Remember, their goal isn't to support one party or the other in an electoral year. This is going to be a very tense year already. They don't care. All they care about is the anger and friction that it creates. Why would we put up with that? We already have those. We have Facebook. We have those that haven't weaponized it. General Stillwell, thank you so much for your time. Thank you. Protests against the Chinese Communist Party broke out at Harvard University over the weekend. It happened when the Chinese ambassador to the U.S. was invited to give a speech at the Institute in Boston. He was interrupted at least three times by student protesters during the speech. Watch. The speaker on the stage is Chinese ambassador Xie Feng. He was invited to give a speech at the opening ceremony of the Kennedy School's China conference. Some of the Saturday protesters were Harvard students. Free Tibet! How can you be here when the Chinese government is in direct contravention of every human rights law in the world? You are a representative of a government that advocates for genocide. The banners they held read, China lies, people die. They continued the demonstration even after being removed from the event. We just got kicked out of our own university. Right now, Xie Feng, the Chinese ambassador to the United States, is inside giving a propaganda speech. We Harvard students went in to tell him that we will not give him this undeserved platform. Xie Feng is spitting bloody, bloody lies telling the good China story. Well, this is the real China story. Zooming in on the situation, video shows a student being forcibly removed from the auditorium. The female protester in the video, Kaset Wu, is an American-born Taiwanese student. The man dragging her out of the hall was found to be a Chinese student named Zhou Hongji. He's studying for a master's degree at Harvard and is a lead member of the university's Chinese Students and Scholars Association. According to the State Department, the body was created by the Chinese Communist Party, designed to, quote, monitor students and mobilize them against views that descend from the party stance. That's on top of spreading pro-Beijing propaganda. Media reports also revealed Zhou's parents have close ties to the regime. His father reportedly serves as a province-level official in China. Back to the Harvard protests. Outside, protesters called on the school not to spread Chinese propaganda. The demonstration focused on human rights violations in Tibet, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Xinjiang, known to its native Uyghur population as East Turkestan. We are here to protest about the conditions in China, the way they treat people, the persecution of so many different groups, the Falun Gong, the Uyghurs, the Tibetans and underground Christians. We like to protest wherever you go. So this time he's in Boston, so we're here. So far, protesters have not faced backlash from the university. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is heading to China this week. It will be his second visit to Beijing as America's top diplomat. He went to China last year to stabilize relations. After tensions rose when the U.S. military shot down a Chinese spy balloon, the aircraft had been detected over U.S. military sites. A State Department official says Blinken will meet with senior Chinese officials in both Shanghai and Beijing during his two-day visit that begins on Wednesday. The trip comes as the wars in Gaza and Ukraine continue. And North Korea remains a threat in the region. The United States is especially concerned about Beijing's support for Russia during its ongoing conflict with Kiev. The future of Taiwan is also expected to be a topic of conversation. The U.S. out-innovated China. That's according to U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo on Sunday. She says the microchip that powers Huawei's latest smartphone isn't as advanced as its American-made counterparts. Meaning the U.S.'s effort to stop sending American technology to China is working. Washington has active sanctions on the Chinese telecom giant. Here's more. They were the subject of patriotic acclaim in China. But Washington says the Chinese chips in Huawei's latest phones are actually evidence that its curbs on supplies to the country are working. The Mate 60 handset debuted last year, powered by an advanced locally-made chip. Last week, the phone maker unveiled new models, thought to use an upgraded version of the silicon. The chips are reportedly made by China's Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. In Beijing, that's been cast as evidence of the country's ability to overcome restrictions on the supply of advanced semiconductors. Over the weekend, U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said the reverse was true. Speaking to CBS, she said the Chinese chips were nowhere near as advanced as the latest U.S. models and hence proof that the supply curbs are working. Huawei has been on a Washington blacklist for years. That's over allegations that it could help spy on Americans, charges the firm strongly denies. Restrictions have also been imposed on Chinese semiconductor manufacturers. The Biden administration says it continues to evaluate whether Huawei's new chips have violated export rules. A major marijuana bust in Maine is the latest example of what authorities are calling a new trend. The DEA is looking into criminal groups from different countries growing illegal marijuana in around 20 states, including Maine. In a high-profile incident, authorities arrested a man born in China. He's accused of transforming a house into a high-tech grow operation. Police arrested Zisheng Guo and seized 40 pounds of marijuana in February. Police zeroed in on the operation in part because of the home's utility bills. After the home was purchased, electricity use went from around $300 a month to nearly $9,000. That's consistent with heat pumps, lighting and other gear needed to grow marijuana. The legality of marijuana cultivation in states like Maine tends to provide cover for illegal grow operations. The marijuana is then trafficked in states where it is illegal. On Friday, Guo was ordered to be held without bail on federal drug charges. A detention hearing is scheduled for Monday. Five people allegedly spying for the Chinese Communist regime have been uncovered in Europe. On Monday, both Germany and the UK reported their investigations, accusing the suspects of breaching government secrets and intellectual property, which could aid the Chinese military. The three arrests for suspected espionage for a Chinese intelligence service are a great success for our counterintelligence, our security authorities. We are aware of the considerable danger posed by Chinese espionage in business, industry and science. We are keeping a very close eye on these risks. On Monday, German authorities arrested three people suspected of spying for China. They're accused of stealing information on technology with potential military use. One of the suspects was allegedly an agent for an employee of China's Ministry of State Security. He's accused of recording information in Germany on military technology for that person. To do that, he allegedly used a couple who own a company that works with German researchers. The same day, police in the UK reported that they also caught two men spying for China. One of them has been working as a researcher under a UK lawmaker from the governing Conservative Party. They were charged with providing prejudicial information to China, which violated the country's Official Secrets Act. And the court date for both is set on this Friday. China hasn't commented on either set of charges. That's all for today's China In Focus on YouTube. We're now sharing a shortened version of our program here, after being demonetized for three years. If you'd like to support us, consider donating. Find us at donorbox.org slash china-in-focus. Or subscribe to our partner platform, Epic TV, where you can watch our full episodes. Just click the link down below. Here's what to look out for in our second half. Heavy rainstorms kill at least four people in southern China, with a bridge collapsing into the river below after the powerful downpour. Emails allegedly revealing the FBI was tipped off about potential coronavirus manipulation. It's linked to U.S. funding for Chinese research. And thousands gather in one of the globe's largest Chinese communities outside China to march against the communist regime's persecution of faith. The event marking the 25th anniversary of a peaceful appeal in Beijing. More on that after the break, here on China In Focus. Thanks for watching China In Focus. I'm Tiffany Meyer. See you tomorrow.