Pelosi says not yet decided on TikTok ban bill

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Pelosi says not yet decided on TikTok ban bill

WASHINGTON Speaker Nancy Pelosi said on Thursday that she had yet to decide whether or not the U.S. House of Representatives will join the Senate in passing legislation that would bar federal government employees from using Chinese-owned TikTok on government-owned devices.

We're checking with the administration in terms of language, not in terms of opposition to the idea, Pelosi told reporters a day after the Senate vote. I don't know that it will be on the agenda next week, but it's very important. The Senate bill would need to be passed by the house before the end of the congressional session next week. Georgia Governor Brian Kemp said Thursday that the state is joining North Dakota, Idaho and Iowa and a growing number of US states in banning ByteDance Ltd-owned TikTok from state-owned devices due to concerns that data could be passed on to the Chinese government. Kemp has also slowed the use of Tencent Holdings' WeChat app and Russian Telegram on government devices.

TikTok said on Thursday that the Senate bill did nothing to advance U.S. national security interests. It said it hoped that instead of continuing down that road, Republican Senator Josh Hawley, who sponsored the Senate bill, would urge the Biden administration to advance an agreement that would address his concerns.

The Democratic Senator Dick Durbin urged Americans to stop using TikTok. Maybe America has reached a point where we realize that our innermost secrets, privacy, and security are at stake, according to Durbin, who spokeswoman for MSNBC.

Several federal agencies, including the Defense, Homeland Security, and State, ban TikTok from government-owned devices.

Republican Senator Marco Rubio unveiled bipartisan legislation that would ban TikTok in the United States. At a hearing last month, FBI Director Chris Wray said TikTok's U.S. operations raise national security concerns.

In 2020, Republican-controlled President Donald Trump tried to block new users from downloading TikTok and ban other transactions that would have blocked the application's use in the United States, but lost a series of court battles over the measure.