On Monday, Former President Trump expressed his strong disapproval of Facebook and reiterated his stance against banning TikTok.
“Frankly, there are a lot of people on TikTok that love it. There are a lot of young kids on TikTok who will go crazy without it. There are a lot of users,” Trump said during a recent CNBC appearance.
“There’s a lot of good and a lot of bad with TikTok. But the thing I don’t like is, without TikTok you can make Facebook bigger. And I consider Facebook to be an enemy of the people, along with the media,” he continued.
Reporters at CNBC pointed out that Trump had labeled TikTok as a national security concern during his initial term in office.
Trump reiterated his belief that the government should safeguard Americans’ privacy and data rights.
“If you look at some of our American companies … they’re not so American,” Trump said. “They deal in which, and if China wants anything from them, they will give it. So that’s a national security risk also,” Trump said.
“But when I look at it, I’m not looking to make Facebook double the size, and if you ban TikTok, Facebook and others, but mostly Facebook, will be a big beneficiary,” he added.
The ex-president verified a recent meeting with Jeff Yass, a prominent GOP contributor and TikTok investor.
However, he mentioned that Yass did not discuss TikTok during their conversation.
During Trump’s presidency in 2020, he promised to prohibit the video-based social media app from functioning in the U.S. and issued a directive for ByteDance to sell off TikTok’s U.S. operations.
Nevertheless, the court later halted the order.
Last Friday, Trump expressed doubts about the idea of banning TikTok, following the introduction of bipartisan legislation that would force ByteDance to sell its ownership or risk a ban in the U.S.
The House Energy and Commerce Committee approved the legislation on Thursday with unanimous support.
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