The House-passed measure designed to force China’s ByteDance to divest TikTok is only part of an expanding effort aimed at curtailing China’s tech ties to the United States.
As lawmakers were voting on the TikTok measure on March 13, members of a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee were marking up three such bills. They would require officials to identify routers, modems and other communications devices that may have tech content from China, identify telecom entities that have ownership ties there and prohibit the use of drones made by Chinese companies.
The Chinese Communist Party poses “a significant threat to American security and economic leadership,” Rep. Bob Latta, R-Ohio, chair of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology, said before the markup. “China is aggressively trying to overtake the United States as the global leader in communications and technology.”
