Nebraska Panhandle News

Yesterday, U.S. Senator Pete Ricketts spoke on the Senate floor, urging the Chinese Communist Party and its leader, Xi Jinping, to permit ByteDance to sell TikTok to American owners. His comments came as he opposed a unanimous consent request from U.S. Senator Edward Markey, which sought to extend the deadline for a potential sale.

"ByteDance was given 270 days to make a deal," Ricketts stated. "The Communist dictator Xi Jinping clearly did not want it. They tried to lobby us. They avoided getting a deal done. President Trump came into office. They are still avoiding getting a deal done."

Ricketts emphasized that TikTok needs to be sold to an American owner for continued operation and criticized any proposal that would allow continued influence by the Chinese Communist Party on TikTok's algorithm.

"The law is very clear. TikTok needs to be sold to an American owner to continue operation," said Ricketts. "Not some half-baked plan, as my colleague from Arkansas was describing, where the Chinese Communist Party would still have influence on the TikTok algorithm, still have the ability to push their propaganda to the American people. That cannot happen. We need to make sure that the Chinese Communist Party cannot do that in our country again."

Ricketts highlighted the large user base of 170 million people who use TikTok in the U.S., with 52% reportedly getting their news from the platform. He compared this market access to restrictions on American TV news stations and questioned the logic of allowing such foreign influence.

"Let's recall that in Communist China, there really isn’t such a thing as a private company, as much as ByteDance might want to say it is," Ricketts noted. "Chinese Communist law is very clear that companies in China have to do what they’re told to do by the Chinese Communist Party. And that’s one of the reasons TikTok is so dangerous."

Ricketts concluded his remarks by opposing any future Chinese ownership that would permit ongoing influence and expressed his concern for the impact on young people.

"And therefore, Mr. President, I object," Ricketts concluded.

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