Biden Administration Quietly Carves TikTok Ban Loophole for Itself, Leaked Document Shows
TikTok ban for thee but not for me
The looming ban on TikTok will not apply to certain U.S. State Department employees responsible for “public diplomacy,” according to an internal cable signed by Secretary of State Antony Blinken that I obtained. According to the document, the Biden administration has quietly exempted these personnel from the ban “regardless of any potential failure of TikTok to be divested of its foreign PRC [People’s Republic of China] ownership.” Here’s why that’s ironic.
Public diplomacy refers to U.S. State Department messaging (i.e., propaganda) targeted at foreign audiences to “promote U.S. interests abroad,” as the Department puts it. In other words, while the Biden administration is trying to ban Chinese-owned TikTok over concerns about foreign influence operations, the White House is quietly working to use TikTok for its own foreign influence activities. This is just one of a bundle of contradictions in the administration’s attempt to ban the app, not the least of which includes the fact that both the Biden and Harris campaigns aggressively used TikTok last year to reach millions of voters.
A spokesperson for the State Department did not respond to a request for comment at the time of publication.
The Supreme Court is currently hearing a case brought by TikTok arguing that the proposed ban would violate the First Amendment. At the heart of the debate is whether TikTok is distinctive enough that Americans’ speech taking place on the platform could not happen elsewhere. Publicly, the Biden administration argues that competing platforms are plenty good enough to substitute for TikTok. But privately the administration appears to think otherwise, as the cable I obtained suggests.
The document opens with an explicit reference to the “substantial opportunity-cost” of being unable to use TikTok, saying:
“The Bureau of Global Public Affairs (GPA) recognizes the substantial opportunity-cost of public diplomacy (PD) practitioners' inability to access TikTok and is pleased to share the Department has approved two limited exceptions to the general prohibitions on use of the platform.”
So if you, the American public, would like to exercise your First Amendment rights on TikTok, tough luck: Instagram and YouTube are good enough. Never mind the suite of intuitive video editing software available on TikTok but not those other platforms — quit your whining and make do. Unless, of course, you’re the government, in which case only TikTok will do. In fact, the cable stresses how crucial the platform is due to its popularity and status as “a primary source of news for audiences around the world,” particularly among young people:
“The platform, now one of the most downloaded digital platforms globally, is increasingly a primary source of news for audiences around the world — including those under 35 years of age, a critical demographic for PD engagement. In the near term, conversations on the platform shape the policy environment in which we operate; longer-term, they are shaping the perceptions of a generation of foreign audiences.”
The cable, dated January 5 of this year and sent to the State Department’s Public Affairs Section (PAS), goes on to explain the legal maneuver the Biden administration used to carved out the loophole. While the 2022 No TikTok on Government Devices Act prohibits the use of the app on government devices, the cable points to a section of the law that permits agencies to make “exceptions for…national security interests and activities.” So the State Department conducted “an assessment of national security and legal considerations,” and — surprise! — public diplomacy officials qualify (as well as contractors). As is often the case, national security is a more elastic concept than the First Amendment.
The cable describes two categories of exception in particular. The first pertains to “monitoring and analysis on TikTok,” under which they’re allowed to lurk on the platform but not post. The second category applies to contracting with digital content creators. A section on this second category includes the following suggestive remark: “There is increasing PD interest in and need to contract with digital content creators who focus on foreign audiences to produce and disseminate content about the Department’s work.”
We all might be banned from TikTok, but hey, at least MrBeast can still do sponsored content for Uncle Sam. (He already explored one such deal with the Pentagon, as
recently reported.) What’s not to like?
Just when you think the last mask has dropped, when the final hypocrisy has been exposed, we learn, yet again, the depravity of our government has no bounds, and no level below it will not eagerly sink to.
Even funnier, those "equivalent" platforms are American owned and have a long history of censorship in favor of the US imperial machine (post about Palestine being suppressed, Zionist posts being boosted, etc.).