[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 194 (Monday, November 27, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5593-S5594]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                                 TikTok

  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam President, over the past 52 days, we have 
watched a horrifying propaganda campaign take over our social media 
platforms.
  Anti-Israel sentiment and support for Hamas terrorism has gone 
mainstream, and even Biden administration officials like Jake Sullivan 
admit that Hamas is using popular online platforms to push propaganda. 
Of course, TikTok is the enabler-in-chief in this regard.
  Here are some stats for you: Between October 23 and 30, videos with 
the ``StandWithPalestine'' hashtag received 285 million views globally, 
while videos with ``StandWithIsrael'' hashtag received just 64 million 
views.
  Now, keep in mind, these stats reflect the online discourse 
surrounding the deadliest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust 3 weeks 
after it happened. Everyone has seen the pictures and videos of what 
Hamas had done. We knew that they were holding innocent people and 
families and children hostage.
  It is terrible enough on its own, but we know that it is also a 
symptom of a very serious disease. We have seen more than enough 
evidence to suggest that TikTok's executives are manipulating user 
sentiment with Israel. Why would they do this? Because leveraging the 
anti-Israel cause is in the best interest of their handlers in the 
Chinese Communist Party.
  By silencing Americans and those who are pro-Israel and other 
westerners who counter anti-Semitic propaganda, they can ingratiate 
themselves with the Arab world and undermine the United States as the 
global superpower and chief mediator in the Middle East.
  They know that by doing this, they are normalizing terrorism and 
genocide, but it puts the CCP and their partners in the new ``axis of 
evil'' even one step closer to global domination, and that is their 
goal. Russia, China, Iran, North Korea--that ``axis of evil''--they 
intend to push themselves to global domination. So going after Israel, 
going after pro-Israel, allowing anti-Semitic conversations to be 
carried out, they are OK with that. They look at it and say: small 
price to pay for us to be able to get our way.
  Well, I have looked through the past few weeks of coverage of the 
role of TikTok and how they have played into this, and I came across 
story after story defending the platform and the firehose of pro-
terrorist content that it promotes. And, of course, you are going to 
have story after story defending TikTok--of course--because it is OK 
with them to promote terrorism and to promote genocide.
  Lately, those same mainstream media outlets have all been obsessed 
with context, and I think we can all benefit from understanding the 
context around what is happening with this content that is online.
  Here is the context: The context is, the Chinese Communist Party has 
complete control over what does and does not go viral on TikTok.
  A Forbes investigation into TikTok and ByteDance--and ByteDance is 
the Beijing company that owns TikTok, the CCP board member of 
ByteDance.
  So the Forbes investigation into TikTok and ByteDance revealed that a 
ByteDance tool, which is run by TikTok staff in China, is tracking 
mentions of what it considers to be ``sensitive words.'' They do this 
across the company's products.
  Now, some of these sensitive words may be things that are anti-CCP, 
anti-positions of the CCP, anti-Xi Jinping or anti-Mao. Those are 
considered sensitive. They draw the attention, and they get labeled by 
the staff as ``sensitive words'' that are forbidden or that must be 
killed or that are prohibited. In other words, TikTok is censoring the 
speech, and they are, in part, blocking some posts from ever being 
seen. This is why you have the hundreds of millions who are seeing pro-
Hamas posts and the tens of millions who are seeing a pro-Israel post.
  There is something else that we should all be aware of. And parents, 
listen up on this. The tool also tracks every time one of these words 
comes up. So if you are repeatedly posting something that is pro-
Israel, that gets tracked every time. Also, it is recording who said 
it, so your identity is revealed, and where you are located. Think 
about that--who you are, where you are located, what you are saying. 
That is surveillance and tracking.
  Now, as this Chamber is aware, Senator Blumenthal and I and others at 
Commerce and Judiciary Committees have had lots of hearings on these 
social media platforms. And at one of the hearings, we had TikTok's CEO 
come before Congress, and he told lawmakers, under oath, that his 
platform does not promote or remove content at the request of the 
Chinese Government.
  What we now know? That is false. They are doing this.
  But word lists in ByteDance's ``sensitive words'' tool deal directly 
with content that Beijing wants to silence, including language critical 
of China's Government, their military, their history.
  Simply tracking speech isn't enough for communist China. They are 
using these tools to control dissent. In April of this year, Joe 
Biden's own Department of Justice announced that they were 
investigating the CCP's use of social media platforms to hunt people 
down and silence them.
  They charged 40 officers of China's national police with 
orchestrating transnational repression schemes against Chinese 
dissidents living--get this--living in the United States. There, again, 
they are coming after our citizens, trying to censure, trying to 
control, trying to manipulate.
  If TikTok's bias pushed their algorithm in the other direction, 
Congress would have already banned it in the United States. Instead, 
the vast majority of the left and their friends in the media are 
treating the pervasiveness of this pro-Hamas, pro-terrorist, pro-murder 
sentiment like the latest viral phenomenon.
  The best, most recent example of this is the appalling popularity of 
Osama bin Laden's letter to America. This

[[Page S5594]]

didn't happen on its own. We had TikTok pushing along on this. The 
TikTokers thought that the architect of the 9/11 attacks made some good 
points. Their obsession spread to other platforms as well. At one 
point, the letter clocked in more than 719 million impressions, and 
that was just on X.
  TikTok eventually took down mentions of the letter, but by then the 
anti-Semites had revealed themselves and exposed other young people to 
the insanity in their videos. It is disgusting--absolutely disgusting--
that you would have the applauding of a letter from Osama bin Laden.
  We have seen this hatred rear its head before in the form of 
stalking, harassment, vandalism, and physical violence. A high school 
in New York descended into chaos last week when a group of teenagers 
formed a lynch mob to hunt down a Jewish teacher who had attended a 
pro-Israel rally.
  Earlier this month, Halal International did a poll and found that 
anti-Semitism on campus has become so out of control that more than 
one-third of Jewish college students feel they have to hide their 
religion. This is appalling. It also shows the ignorance of many of 
these young people, and it is evidence that the CCP's influence 
operation has taken hold.
  So it is time for the U.S. Senate to take this seriously. As I said, 
it is the symptom of a disease. It is neither reasonable nor rational 
to suggest that China would create a tool capable of manipulating 
public opinion on a global scale and then that they would choose not to 
use that tool to their advantage.
  You know, we have talked a lot about TikTok and what they are doing 
in this country. We have talked a lot about how TikTok in China is very 
different; it is an educational tool. It is very different from what 
you see here with funny videos or cat videos or some of the very 
disturbing content that is being pushed on our Nation's youth.
  There is bipartisan agreement that the very existence of this tool--
this surveillance, this propaganda tool--that the Chinese Communist 
Party has created, which we call TikTok--there is evidence that the 
very existence of this poses a threat to our national security and to 
that of our allies, which means the Senate should have absolutely no 
trouble throwing its support behind a ban on TikTok in the United 
States.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Butler). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.