Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Speaker, I rise in actual opposition to the bill.

Mr. Speaker, I know the sponsors of this bill are sincere in their concerns and in their effort to protect Americans. They have described the TikTok application as a Trojan horse, but there are some of us who feel that, either intentionally or unintentionally, this legislation to ban TikTok is actually a Trojan horse. Some of us are concerned that there are First Amendment implications here.

Americans have the right to view information. We don't need to be protected by the government from information. Some of us just don't want the President picking which apps we can put on our phones or which websites we can visit. We don't think that is appropriate.

We also think it is dangerous to give the President that kind of power, to give him the power to decide what Americans can see on their phones and on their computers. To give him that sort of discretion, we also think, is dangerous.

People say that this TikTok ban will only apply to TikTok or maybe another company that pops up just like TikTok, but the bill is written so broadly that the President could abuse that discretion and include other companies that aren't just social media companies and that aren't, as some people would believe, controlled by foreign adversaries. Again, we are giving the President that discretion to decide whether it is controlled by a foreign adversary.

There were some people who were legitimately concerned that this was an overly broad bill, and they got an exclusion written into the bill that I want to read. It says: ``The term `covered company' does not include an entity that operates a website . . . or . . . application whose primary purpose is to allow users to post product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews.''

Why is this exception in the bill? Why did somebody feel like they needed this exception if the bill itself only covers social media applications that foreign adversaries are running? These and other questions we hope to answer in the course of this debate, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BISHOP of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, this is not the first time that restricting speech has been pursued in the interests of national security. In fact, in 5 days' time, next Monday, I will go to the Supreme Court for the first time where I will attend an oral argument in the case of Murphy v. Missouri.

It is a case where agents from the White House, the Department of Justice, and other Federal agencies embedded themselves with American social media companies to manipulate what could appear on social media: expression by the American people.

It has been described by the lower court as the most massive attack on free speech in U.S. history.

Even as that pends for a decision by the Supreme Court, Congress would in this legislation say, in effect: Hold my beer.

I don't use TikTok. I think it is ill-advised to do so. Members of this body are famous on TikTok, and I think that is unwise. Be that as it may, I respect the choices of 170 million users in the United States.

The Trump administration attempted to ban TikTok in 2020. It was held that it couldn't do so in two court decisions because under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, he is subject to the Berman amendment, passed in 1988 by this body, to provide that in the interest of dealing with hostile foreign powers, the President can do all sorts of things with respect to commerce, but he cannot ban the free flow of information across international boundaries.

I have heard that described as a gap in the law, but it is a feature. It is not a bug.

This legislation cannot be described as other than receding from the Berman amendment. That principle in American law--which did not, by the way, emerge from the brow of Representative Berman in 1988--was predicated on a much earlier principle of First Amendment law established in 1965 by the United States Supreme Court in the case Lamont v. Postmaster General which said the American people have a First Amendment right of access to foreign propaganda.

At first, it may be remarkable or strike one as odd to hear that. However, it is because the proper relationship between government and citizen in the United States is that the citizen decides what to be exposed to and what ideologies to embrace and consider and is always free to engage in expression including across international boundaries. That remains the prevailing constitutional law today.

It begs this question: How could it be that Congress should be working hard to devise a means to circumvent that prevailing principle of the First Amendment against the use of a particular means of expression by 170 million Americans?

Isn't it ironic that the technical advisers in the construction of this legislation to design it so that it can get around legislation challenges, including isolating litigation challenges to 180 days and only in the court of appeals in the District of Columbia, those technical advisers are the same folks at the Department of Justice who devised that plan to embed agents of the Department of Justice and other Federal agencies with social media platforms in the United States to restrict what Americans could say online.

Mr. Speaker, America confronts a grave challenge in China, and it will not prevail by becoming more like them.
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Mr. MASSIE. Greene).

Mr. ROBERT GARCIA of California. Mr. Speaker, I have enormous respect for the efforts of my colleagues to focus on security and data protection and I share many of their concerns; however, I disagree with this approach and this bill that could impact 170 million Americans who use TikTok.

One-third of all U.S. adults use the app and millions of entrepreneurs and small business owners use the platform to support their family.

Yes, just like every other social media platform, there is misinformation and privacy concerns on TikTok, and I share those; however, it is important that we don't treat TikTok differently than other platforms.

If we are going to address this issue, we have to take the same approach to all social media platforms. We can't just single out one.

I join many of my colleagues and the ACLU in voicing concern over the freedom of expression. I am a strong supporter of ensuring that TikTok remains an open marketplace. There is no guarantee in this bill that there won't be an interruption of service that could lead to an end of this app. I don't think we fully appreciate the impact this is going to have. Mr. Speaker, I am a strong ``no.''

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Mr. MASSIE. Kamlager-Dove), my friend on the other side of the aisle.

Mr. Speaker, I know the other side is sincere. We have not questioned that here today, and I won't question their sincerity.

In fact, I think they have identified at least three problems that we have in America: moral decay of our society, invasion of Americans' privacy, and our competitiveness with China. However, in this case, their cure is worse than the diseases.

There are ways to get at these root problems. We just haven't taken it upon ourselves to address those root problems with actual legislative solutions that have been put forth here in Congress.

For instance, Mr. Warren Davidson's Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act would put a strong stake in the ground to protect Americans' privacy, whether it is from our own government or some foreign governments. That is the kind of thing we need.

We need warrants in the FISA program. Our government shouldn't be able to spy on Americans without a warrant, yet they are. Let's bring that to the floor and vote on it.

These are the kinds of cures we need, not the bill that is offered here today.

The bill that is offered here today, even though I know it is offered genuinely, could also be named the Facebook protection and enhancement act because it is not the American people who are going to benefit most from this. It will be Facebook. Their stock is going to go up if this bill should pass the Senate.

What are some ways that we could improve this bill? It should at least have a sunset. That is the only reason we are able to debate whether FISA should have warrants in it, because it sunsets. What have we observed? FISA has been abused.

That is my concern with this TikTok ban. It will be abused. If it is just banning TikTok and ByteDance and copies of that, why does it need to be 13 pages long?

I know they say it doesn't ban it, but it forces divestiture of the company. This sounds like when American companies try to do business in Third World countries and a dictator says: You can do business here. You just have to give me your company, and now you can continue to do business.

We wouldn't let another country take over Ford Motor Company for selling Ford cars in their country, yet that is what we are wanting to do here.

Again, this is a cure that is worse than the disease. Who is going to be prosecuted by this bill? Is it ByteDance or TikTok? Will they be taken to court? No. They are the target of this, but how do you elicit or effect a ban on them? By prosecuting Americans.

The only way my colleagues can ban TikTok and the other companies from being here is to say what this bill says, which is the government will bring a civil action suit against you if you so much as host them here. If you have an app store that allows them to be here, and you are an American or an American company, you will be the target of this bill. Those are the only people who can be pursued under this bill. I know it is in order to go after TikTok, or so they say.

I close by saying that we are sitting here with phones made in China. We are wearing suits made in China. We drove cars here with chips that are made in China.

They are a foreign adversary, and, by golly, we are going to do something about it. What are we going to do? My colleagues are going to tell Americans they can't put a piece of software on their computer and can't go to certain websites that the President designates.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose this well-intentioned bill because it will have bad consequences, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 352, nays 65, answered ``present'' 1, not voting 14, as follows: [Roll No. 86] YEAS--352 Adams Aderholt Aguilar Alford Allen Allred Amo Amodei Armstrong Arrington Auchincloss Babin Bacon Baird Balderson Balint Banks Barr Barragan Bean (FL) Beatty Bentz Bera Bergman Beyer Bice Bilirakis Bishop (GA) Blumenauer Blunt Rochester Boebert Bost Brecheen Brown Brownley Buchanan Buck Bucshon Budzinski Burchett Burgess Burlison Calvert Cammack Caraveo Carbajal Cardenas Carey Carl Carson Carter (GA) Carter (LA) Carter (TX) Cartwright Case Casten Castor (FL) Chavez-DeRemer Cherfilus-McCormick Chu Ciscomani Clarke (NY) Cleaver Cline Cloud Clyde Cohen Cole Collins Comer Correa Costa Courtney Craig Crane Crawford Crenshaw Crow Cuellar Curtis D'Esposito Davids (KS) Davis (NC) De La Cruz Dean (PA) DeGette DeLauro DelBene Deluzio DeSaulnier Diaz-Balart Dingell Doggett Donalds Duncan Dunn (FL) Edwards Ellzey Emmer Escobar Eshoo Estes Evans Ezell Fallon Feenstra Ferguson Finstad Fischbach Fitzgerald Fitzpatrick Fleischmann Fletcher Flood Foster Foushee Foxx Franklin, Scott Fry Fulcher Gallagher Garamendi Garbarino Garcia (TX) Garcia, Mike Gimenez Golden (ME) Goldman (NY) Gonzales, Tony Gonzalez, Vicente Good (VA) Gooden (TX) Gottheimer Graves (LA) Graves (MO) Green (TN) Green, Al (TX) Griffith Grothman Guest Guthrie Hageman Harris Harshbarger Hern Hill Hinson Houchin Houlahan Hoyer Hudson Huffman Huizenga Hunt Issa Ivey Jackson (NC) Jackson (TX) James Jeffries Johnson (GA) Johnson (LA) Johnson (SD) Jordan Joyce (OH) Joyce (PA) Kaptur Kean (NJ) Keating Kelly (IL) Kelly (MS) Kelly (PA) Kiggans (VA) Kildee Kiley Kilmer Kim (CA) Krishnamoorthi Kuster Kustoff LaHood LaLota LaMalfa Lamborn Landsman Langworthy Latta LaTurner Lawler Lee (FL) Lee (NV) Leger Fernandez Lesko Letlow Levin Lieu Loudermilk Lucas Luetkemeyer Luna Luttrell Lynch Magaziner Malliotakis Maloy Mann Manning Mast Matsui McBath McCaul McClain McClellan McCollum McCormick McHenry Menendez Meuser Mfume Miller (IL) Miller (OH) Miller (WV) Miller-Meeks Mills Molinaro Moolenaar Moore (UT) Moran Morelle Moskowitz Moulton Mrvan Murphy Napolitano Neguse Nehls Newhouse Nickel Norcross Norman Nunn (IA) Obernolte Owens Pallone Palmer Panetta Pappas Pascrell Payne Pelosi Peltola Pence Perez Peters Pettersen Pfluger Pingree Posey Quigley Raskin Reschenthaler Rodgers (WA) Rogers (AL) Rogers (KY) Rose Rosendale Ross Rouzer Roy Ruiz Ruppersberger Rutherford Ryan Salazar Salinas Sanchez Sarbanes Scalise Scanlon Schiff Schneider Scholten Schrier Scott (VA) Scott, Austin Scott, David Self Sessions Sewell Sherman Sherrill Slotkin Smith (MO) Smith (NE) Smith (NJ) Smith (WA) Smucker Sorensen Soto Spanberger Spartz Stansbury Stanton Stauber Steel Stefanik Steil Stevens Strickland Strong Suozzi Sykes Takano Tenney Thanedar Thompson (CA) Thompson (MS) Thompson (PA) Tiffany Timmons Titus Tokuda Tonko Torres (NY) Trahan Trone Turner Underwood Valadao Van Drew Van Duyne Van Orden Vasquez Veasey Walberg Waltz Wasserman Schultz Waters Watson Coleman Weber (TX) Webster (FL) Wenstrup Westerman Wexton Wild Williams (NY) Wilson (FL) Wilson (SC) Wittman Womack Yakym Zinke NAYS--65 Biggs Bishop (NC) Bonamici Bowman Boyle (PA) Bush Casar Castro (TX) Clark (MA) Clyburn Davidson Duarte Espaillat Frost Gaetz Gallego Garcia (IL) Garcia, Robert Gomez Greene (GA) Hayes Higgins (LA) Himes Horsford Hoyle (OR) Jackson (IL) Jackson Lee Jacobs Jayapal Kamlager-Dove Khanna Larsen (WA) Larson (CT) Lee (CA) Lee (PA) Lofgren Mace Massie McClintock McGarvey McGovern Meeks Meng Mooney Moore (AL) Moore (WI) Mullin Nadler Neal Ocasio-Cortez Omar Perry Phillips Pocan Porter Pressley Ramirez Schakowsky Schweikert Steube Swalwell Torres (CA) Vargas Velazquez Williams (GA) ANSWERED ``PRESENT''--1 Crockett NOT VOTING--14 Connolly Davis (IL) DesJarlais Frankel, Lois Gosar Granger Grijalva Harder (CA) Kim (NJ) Ogles Simpson Tlaib Wagner Williams (TX)

Mr. LARSON of Connecticut changed his vote from ``yea'' to ``nay.''

Messrs. WENSTRUP, CLEAVER, Ms. BALINT, Mr. CARSON, Mses. BOEBERT, and BROWNLEY changed their vote from ``nay'' to ``yea.''

Ms. CROCKETT changed her vote from ``yea'' to ``present.''

So (two-thirds being in the affirmative) the rules were suspended and the bill, as amended, was passed.

The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.

A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

Stated for:

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