Squad member Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (D-NY) has now taken the stage to try and debate regarding the ongoing discussion for a nationwide ban on the Chinese-owned social media platform TikTok.
Well-known as a Democratic Socialist and a member of the extreme-left-wing “Squad” took to Tik Tok this past Saturday morning to try and fight back against the climbing bipartisan support that is being established in favor of a full-scale nationwide ban on the app. AOC attempted to downplay and minimize all the ongoing worries regarding data privacy and security, claiming that TikTok was just one app known to harvest extreme levels of data from its user base. Instead of seeking to put a ban on any one app, she tried to deflect the talks to a whole different subject, that being more broad data privacy laws.
“Do I believe TikTok should be banned? No,” started the congresswoman. The video happened to be her first post to the app, despite having had an account created on it well over a year ago.
“First of all, I think it’s important to discuss how unprecedented of a move this would be,” she stated. “The United States has never before banned a social media company from existence, from operating in our borders and this is an app that has over 150 million Americans on it,”
At first, AOC put her spotlight on the copious level of criticisms stating that the app is just another disguise for Chinese surveillance and that it steals user data from those that utilize the app. She downplayed those concerns by stating that banning the TikTok app “doesn’t really address the core of the issue, which is the fact that major social media companies are allowed to collect troves of deeply personal data about you that you don’t know about, without really any significant regulation whatsoever.”
“In fact, the United States is one of the only developed nations in the world that has no significant data or privacy protection laws on the books,” she stated. Instead of trying to put a ban against TikTok, which is currently used by well over 150 Americans on a day-to-day basis, the answer seems to be to “actually protect Americans from this kind of egregious data harvesting that companies can do without your significant ability to say no,” she added.
AOC also spoke out to criticize the concerns regarding national security swirling around the app. When Congress is considering making use of legislation that has national security worries, they are given a highly classified briefing; Congress has yet to be given such a classified briefing about the platform. “Why would we be proposing a ban regarding such a significant issue without being clued in on this at all?” she questioned. “It just doesn’t feel right to me.” she also went on to state that Congress should be forced to make its case for the banning of the social media titan to the public.
“But frankly, I think a lot of this is putting the cart before the horse,” she finished. “Our first priority should be in protecting your ability to exist without social media companies harvesting and commodifying every single piece of data about you without you and without your consent.”
