Fox News "Sunday Morning Features" - Transcript Interview with Tom Cotton
Interview
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
BARTIROMO: Joining me right now is Senator Tom Cotton, a Republican from Arkansas, first sounded the alarm about China right here on this program back in February.
Senator, it's always a pleasure. Thanks very much for joining us.
SEN. TOM COTTON (R-AR): Thank you, Maria.
BARTIROMO: So, you have got Microsoft trying to convince everybody that it is OK if it acquires TikTok, it can get rid of the national security issues.
Now we understand Twitter talking to TikTok. What's your view on this? Should TikTok be allowed to get acquired in the United States? Will the Chinese surveillance and espionage ever be eliminated from TikTok at this point?
COTTON: Maria, TikTok is like a Trojan horse on American cell phones.
And that's why I commend the president for taking the action to ban TikTok in America if it is not wholly owned and operated by an American parent company.
I encouraged the administration about a year ago to conduct the security review that ultimately led to this decision. That's because, to most Americans, TikTok seems like a harmless, fun, short-form video app, but behind that app on your phone is a vacuum of data of everything on your device, contacts, e-mails, text messages, photographs, social media posts, even browser history, keystrokes, and location data.
That all goes back to servers in China, where it can be accessed by the Chinese Communist Party for decades to come. That's why, if TikTok is going to operate in the United States, it has to have an American parent and be wholly owned and operated, not just the servers and the data, but all of the source code, the algorithms, the engineers.
There can be no lingering ties to China. And I think we have to be reasonably skeptical about any American companies to do that. They have to demonstrate, to the satisfaction of the U.S. government, that they can server all those ties.
Otherwise, these software companies will have to be banned in America, for the safety and the privacy of Americans, especially our kids.
BARTIROMO: All right.
A couple of things that you said. I want to get back to Microsoft in a moment. But you just went off how -- went through a line of things that TikTok being on your phone can get, just wipe all of the things on your phone and send it back to the CCP.
What would the Chinese Communist Party do with that information? What is the threat? What can they -- how can they hurt us with our own information?
COTTON: There's many threats, Maria.
So, first off, TikTok has been around for several years now. That means that young Americans who were using it are now in their early 20s. Some of those are in sensitive positions in our military or in the federal government or in industry or national laboratories on -- working on cutting-edge projects.
That's why the military has recently forbidden its service members from using TikTok even on their personal devices, because imagine all the sensitive information and text messages and photographs and social media posts that the Chinese Communist Party could use as leverage to manipulate or even blackmail those young Americans.
Or think about the kind of profiles that they are building on Americans that will be used for decades to come. And we have no idea how they're going to be able to use that information.
And then, finally, just that vast trove of data helps them in developing advances in things like artificial intelligence and machine learning.
That is a huge benefit in the 21st century technology economy.
BARTIROMO: So, my question on this story is, how many employees from TikTok will be melded into Microsoft?
I mean, we have seen over and over again how the CCP is able to steal information from the inside, whether it's Motorola, with all of those engineers working for Motorola and sending stuff back to Huawei years ago, or, most recently, Harvard, or Cleveland Clinic. The CCP has been either able to identify people within institutions to send info back or actually get -- hire people and get Americans to do it.
So, how many people from TikTok will end up working for Microsoft? Do we know that?
COTTON: Maria, I think the default answer should be zero, whether it's Microsoft or Twitter or any other company that makes a bid for TikTok, because, as you say, the Chinese Communist Party has a long history of using insiders in our companies, in our laboratories, in our colleges, of stealing technology.
So, it's up to any prospective purchaser of TikTok to demonstrate to the United States government that they will not have any lingering ties to China. And that includes Chinese-based employees, in addition to all of the software and hardware.
BARTIROMO: What are the odds that you think Microsoft or somebody in America acquires TikTok? I mean, this is going to go on -- well, obviously the president is giving it a 45-day deadline.
COTTON: Well, I think that's the president's preferred solution.
He doesn't want to see Americans lose access to what to them is a fun social media app.
BARTIROMO: Right.
COTTON: But, at the same time, we're committed to protecting their privacy and their safety.
So, it'll be up to the technical experts in our government to assess what Microsoft or TikTok or any other purchaser might do. But it's on those companies' shoulders to demonstrate that complete and total break from the Chinese Communist Party and from mainland China.
BARTIROMO: All right, I want to move on to what China has -- is now doing in Japan.
We continue to see the CCP doing power grabs. First, it was India, gaining territory in India. Now you have got a conflict over here in Japan, right around the Senkaku Islands. And this is the longest continued presence along the Senkaku Islands since 2012.
Also, China is expected to end the fishing ban in the South China Sea. We're expecting U.S. vessels there in the upcoming weeks.
Tell me what's going on with this latest power grab of the Communist Party.
COTTON: Yes, Maria, I think you're right that this is just a continued instance of the pattern that China has over the last six months of using this pandemic for cover to take aggressive action against our neighbors.
As you say, they essentially invaded India and killed 20 Indians a couple months ago. They also cracked down on Hong Kong.
And now they are once again up to no good in the Senkaku Islands. This is a small set of islands just to the north of Taiwan, to the east of China, on -- or in the East China Sea. They sit on very critical commercial routes. They have very rich fishing waters. They sit atop oil and gas.
China, as you say, now has had a presence around those islands for the longest period of time since 2012, the last time there was a flare-up. And, notably, China is saying that they are going to lift the ban on fishing around those islands next Saturday.
If that happens, I would predict that you would see a large number of fishing vessels, many of which are going to be cloaked -- or, actually, are going to be, in reality, Chinese coast guard or even Chinese navy, probably armored up and ready to fight back against Japan's desire and intent to enforce its longstanding claim to those islands.
So, we need to make it very clear to China that we will uphold our defense treaty with Japan and that those islands are rightfully belong -- they are rightfully controlled by Japan, and they should be settled only by arbitration and by negotiation, not by force.
BARTIROMO: I just want to point out that, just this week, we saw in the South China Sea Chinese air force stepping up combat readiness drills, a number of drills.
There was actually video out there of this, but, mysteriously, that video has been taken down. So, we will be watching the South China Sea, of course.
Senator, it's great to see you this morning. Thank you, sir.
COTTON: Thank you, Maria.
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Source