The Uyghur Union strongly supports efforts by the United States government to address the dangers posed by TikTok and its parent company ByteDance, which is ultimately controlled by the Chinese government. We have serious concerns about ByteDance’s documented practices of suppressing content related to Uyghurs, Tibetans, and other marginalized groups, as well as its misuse of user data that could enable state surveillance and human rights abuses.

TikTok represents a malign influence that allows the Chinese Communist Party to infringe on American values of freedom of expression, privacy rights, and a free press. ByteDance’s censorship of Uyghur and Tibetan human rights activists speaking out about the atrocities they have experienced is particularly abhorrent and cannot be tolerated on American social media platforms.

We urge Congress and the administration to remain steadfast in taking strong measures, including forced divestment or an outright ban, to prevent TikTok and ByteDance from further infiltrating American society and manipulating our youth. Allowing an extension of Beijing’s censorship and digital authoritarianism to take root would do grave harm to U.S. national security interests.

The United States must set an example for the world by drawing a clear line against Chinese government efforts to surveil, control, and import human rights violations associated with its techno-dystopian model. We stand in solidarity with all those persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party.