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TikTok and its CEO are fighting to save the app in the US | CNN Business

Published

2 years ago

March 22, 2023

TikTok and its CEO are fighting to save the app in the US | CNN Business

As a rising variety of lawmakers increase nationwide safety considerations about TikTok’s ties to China, and a few consultants fear in regards to the app’s influence on younger individuals’s psychological well being, CNN is internet hosting a particular to dig into these points. Watch “CNN Primetime: Is time up for TikTok?” Thursday, March 23 at 9 p.m. ET.

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At a Harvard Enterprise Assessment convention earlier this month, the place executives, professors and artists appeared for talks on company management and emotional intelligence, Shou Chew tried to save lots of his firm.

In his speak, Chew, the CEO of TikTok, stated the social community wouldn’t present US consumer information to the Chinese language authorities and has by no means been requested to take action. Chew burdened the steps TikTok has taken to guard US consumer information. And 4 separate occasions, Chew instructed the viewers that the platform’s mission was to “encourage creativity and convey pleasure” to customers.

The Harvard occasion is only one of a number of media appearances Chew has made in current weeks amid mounting scrutiny of TikTok and of himself. Chew is ready to testify on Thursday for the primary time earlier than a Congressional committee about “TikTok’s shopper privateness and information safety practices, the platforms’ influence on youngsters, and its relationship with the Chinese language Communist Celebration,” in line with an announcement final week from the committee. In the meantime, federal officers are actually demanding the app’s Chinese language homeowners promote their stake within the social media platform, or danger dealing with a US ban of the app.

Chew, a Singaporean who has largely stayed out of the highlight since taking up TikTok in 2021, just lately sat for interviews with a number of US newspapers and this week confirmed up in a video on the company TikTok account to focus on the huge attain of the app, which he revealed now has greater than 150 million customers in the USA.

“That’s virtually half the US coming to TikTok to attach, to create, to share, to be taught, or simply to have some enjoyable,” stated Chew, carrying in a hoodie and t-shirt like some other American tech government within the clip. “This comes at a pivotal second for us. Some politicians have began speaking about banning TikTok, now this might take TikTok away from all 150 million of you.”

Chew’s heightened visibility seems to be half of a bigger messaging marketing campaign by TikTok to bolster its repute within the US and remind voters – and their representatives – how important the social community is to American tradition.

A press convention is deliberate for Wednesday with dozens of social media creators on the steps of the Capitol, a few of whom have been flown on the market by TikTok. The corporate is paying for a blitz of commercials for a Beltway viewers. And final week it put out a docuseries highlighting American small enterprise homeowners who depend on the platform for his or her livelihoods.

Behind the scenes, Chew has additionally met with members of Congress and TikTok just lately invited researchers and lecturers to its Washington, D.C., workplaces to be taught extra about how it’s working to deal with lawmakers considerations over its ties to China via its mother or father firm, ByteDance. Its mother or father firm has additionally ramped up federal lobbying, spending greater than $5 million final yr, in line with information tracked by OpenSecrets.

“It’s life or dying for TikTok, from their perspective,” stated Justin Sherman, the CEO of World Cyber Methods, D.C.-based analysis and advisory agency, who was among the many researchers TikTok invited to be briefed on “Mission Texas,” the corporate’s $1.5 billion initiative to deal with lawmakers’ safety considerations. “They’re throwing the whole lot they will on the drawback.”

In an announcement, TikTok spokesman Jamal Brown stated: “A U.S. ban on TikTok may have a direct influence on the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of People. Lawmakers in Washington debating TikTok ought to hear firsthand from individuals whose lives can be immediately affected by their selections.”

For a lot of the previous yr, TikTok has been rolling out new options and insurance policies to deal with privateness and safety considerations that the Chinese language authorities may acquire entry to US consumer information, in addition to broader fears that its app, like different social platforms, could be dangerous to some youthful customers.

TikTok just lately set a default one-hour each day display screen time restrict on each account for customers below 18 in one of the crucial aggressive strikes but by a social media firm to stop teenagers from endlessly scrolling. It rolled out a characteristic that aimed to supply extra data to customers about why its highly effective algorithm recommends sure movies. And the corporate pledged extra transparency to researchers.

Going through considerations about its mother or father firm’s ties to China, TikTok has additionally taken plenty of steps to extra clearly separate its US operations and consumer information from different elements of the group. That features transferring all its US consumer information to Oracle’s cloud platform, the place it says it hosts “100% of US consumer site visitors.”

The messaging marketing campaign has solely ramped up this week forward of the listening to. TikTok rolled out refreshed Group Tips for content material, which the corporate framed as being “based mostly on our dedication to uphold human rights and aligned with worldwide authorized frameworks.” And Chew as soon as once more burdened TikTok’s independence from China.

“I perceive that there are considerations stemming from the incorrect perception that TikTok’s company construction makes it beholden to the Chinese language authorities or that it shares details about U.S. customers with the Chinese language authorities,” Chew stated in ready remarks forward of his testimony earlier than Congress. “That is emphatically unfaithful.”

On the similar time, TikTok is now betting on a technique from American tech corporations who’ve confronted scrutiny for different causes, enjoying up the influence it has on small companies in the USA, together with with the CEO’s ready remarks and a mini docuseries it launched final week titled “TikTok Sparks Good.”

The collection spotlighted inspiring tales of American small enterprise homeowners and creators. The primary of the 60-second clips includes a Mississippi cleaning soap maker with a deep Southern accent who constructed her firm on the app, and the second options an educator who stop his job to give attention to sharing informational movies on TikTok aimed toward educating toddlers the way to learn.

“Due to TikTok, I’m reaching hundreds of thousands of households who wish to educate their toddlers the way to learn,” the educator says.

Dozens of TikTok creators who oppose a ban can even be holding a press convention on Capitol grounds on Wednesday night with Congressman Jamaal Bowman, a Democrat from New York. TikTok flew out a number of the creators, the corporate confirmed to CNN. (The Info was first to report the transfer.)

The record of anticipated attendees features a disabled Asian American creator utilizing her platform to fight ableism, a small enterprise proprietor from South Carolina who launched a greeting card firm by way of TikTok, and an Ohio-based chef who constructed her bakery enterprise by way of the app. A few of the creators have lots of of thousand and even hundreds of thousands of followers on TikTok.

Even with these efforts, Sherman expressed some skepticism about how persuasive the PR push will probably be, largely due to how divided Washington is true now.

“Not everybody needs a ban,” he stated. “For some lawmakers, it should matter that TikTok is taking all these steps to deal with safety considerations.”

However for others, it gained’t transfer the needle. “Some lawmakers, frankly, don’t care what advertisements TikTok is taking out, what pledges it’s making on its weblog about independence, information privateness … They see an unmitigable danger of Chinese language authorities entry to information and/or affect over content material, and so are going to push for a whole ban.”

Lindsay Gorman, a senior fellow for rising applied sciences on the German Marshall Fund’s Alliance for Securing Democracy and a former Biden administration adviser, stated that “by and huge, TikTok’s lobbying efforts thus far have been fairly ineffective.”

The issue, she stated, is two-fold. First, even when TikTok takes steps to bolster its safeguards right this moment, because it has been doing with Mission Texas, considerations stay that it’s at all times “one replace away from changing into a vulnerability.” And second, TikTok’s PR efforts in Washington gained’t undo earlier moments when the corporate “shot itself within the foot” by making what she stated had been “inaccurate statements” to Congress, “after which having revelations come out exhibiting that these had been inaccurate.”

After the preliminary, Trump-era requires a TikTok ban appeared to fade in Washington, BuzzFeed reported in 2021 that US consumer information was repeatedly accessed from China and that “the whole lot is seen in China.” The main points within the report had been seemingly at odds with remarks a TikTok government gave earlier than a Senate panel earlier that yr, claiming {that a} US-based safety group decides who can entry US consumer information from China. Following the report, TikTok as soon as once more grew to become a scorching button situation within the nation’s capital.

However at the same time as suspicion amongst US lawmakers grew, so did the app’s reputation within the nation.

“I do assume TikTok’s strongest argument to this point is drawing on its creator consumer base,” Gorman stated. However for some lawmakers with safety considerations, the most recent push “could also be too little too late.”

In his TikTok video on Tuesday, Chew appealed on to customers of the app. The CEO requested them to write down within the feedback part to share “what you need your elected representatives to find out about what you like about TikTok.”

The highest touch upon the clip, which has acquired upwards of fifty,000 likes, merely reads: “You realize one thing went improper when the boss has to indicate up 😂”

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‘Mission South Africa’: How Trump Is Offering White Afrikaners Refugee Status

Published

6 hours ago

March 30, 2025

Press Room

‘Mission South Africa’: How Trump Is Offering White Afrikaners Refugee Status

Almost immediately after taking office, President Trump began shutting down refugee resettlement programs, slashing billions of dollars in funding and making it all but impossible for people from scores of countries to seek haven in the United States.

With one exception.

The Trump administration has thrown open the doors to white Afrikaners from South Africa, establishing a program called “Mission South Africa” to help them come to the United States as refugees, according to documents obtained by The New York Times.

Under Phase One of the program, the United States has deployed multiple teams to convert commercial office space in Pretoria, the capital of South Africa, into ad hoc refugee centers, according to the documents. The teams are studying more than 8,200 requests expressing interest in resettling to the United States and have already identified 100 Afrikaners who could be approved for refugee status. The government officials have been directed to focus particularly on screening white Afrikaner farmers.

The administration has also provided security escorts to officials conducting the interviews of potential refugees.

By mid-April, U.S. officials on the ground in South Africa will “propose long-term solutions, to ensure the successful implementation of the president’s vision for the dignified resettlement of eligible Afrikaner applicants,” according to one memo sent from the embassy in Pretoria to the State Department in Washington this month.

The administration’s focus on white Afrikaners comes as it effectively bans the entry of other refugees — including about 20,000 people from countries like Afghanistan, Congo and Syria who were ready to travel to the United States before Mr. Trump took office. In court filings about those other refugees, the administration has argued that core functions of the refugee program had been “terminated” after the president’s ban, so it did not have the resources to take in any more people.

“There’s no subtext and nothing subtle about the way this administration’s immigration and refugee policy has obvious racial and racist overtones,” said Vanessa Cárdenas, the executive director of America’s Voice. “While they seek to single out Afrikaners for special treatment, they simultaneously want us to think mostly Black and brown vetted newcomers are dangerous despite their background checks and all evidence to the contrary.”

The program also inserts the United States into a charged debate inside South Africa, where some members of the white Afrikaner minority have begun a campaign to suggest that they are the true victims in post-apartheid South Africa. Under apartheid, a white minority government discriminated against South Africans of color, and brutality and violence flourished, leading to torture, disappearances and murder.

There have been murders of white farmers, the focus of the Afrikaner grievances, but police statistics show they are not any more vulnerable to violent crime than others in the country. In South Africa, more than 90 percent of the population comes from racial groups persecuted by the racist, apartheid regime.

In a statement, the State Department said it was focused on resettling Afrikaners who have been “victims of unjust racial discrimination.” The agency confirmed that it had begun interviewing applicants and said they would need to pass “stringent background and security checks.”

The decision to unleash resources for Afrikaners just starting the refugee process, while stonewalling court demands to process those fleeing other countries who have already been cleared for travel, risks upending an American refugee program that has been the foundation of the United States’ role for the vulnerable, according to resettlement officials.

“The government clearly has the ability to process applications when it wants to,” said Melissa Keaney, a senior supervising attorney for the International Refugee Assistance Project, the group representing plaintiffs trying to restart refugee processing.

Mr. Trump signed an executive order suspending refugee admissions on his first day in office, arguing that welcoming refugees could compromise resources for Americans. He added that future versions of the program should prioritize “only those refugees who can fully and appropriately assimilate into the United States.”

A federal judge in Seattle later temporarily blocked that executive order and instructed the administration to restore the refugee program. But the Trump administration still cut contracts with organizations that assist those applying for refugee status overseas, reducing the infrastructure needed to support people seeking refuge in the United States.

An appeals court ruled last week that the administration must admit those thousands of people who were granted refugee status before Mr. Trump entered office, but also declined to stop him from halting the admission of new refugees.

The Justice Department has for weeks deflected demands from refugee advocates accusing the administration of sidestepping the court order and delaying the process of almost every refugee previously granted a ticket to come to the United States. The Trump administration has said it has allowed a limited number of refugees who were vetted to enter the country, although the State Department declined to provide a number.

Lawyers for the Justice Department have argued both that the administration now lacks resources to help thousands of refugees and that in restarting the program the government reserves the right to “do so in a manner that reflects administration priorities.”

Mr. Trump has made clear what those priorities were when he created a refugee carve-out for white Afrikaners. Mr. Trump at the time accused the South African government of confiscating the land of white Afrikaners, backing a long-held conspiracy theory about the mistreatment of white South Africans in the post-apartheid era.

Mr. Trump was referring to a recent policy signed into law by the South African government, known as the Expropriation Act. It repeals an apartheid-era law and allows the government in certain instances to acquire privately held land in the public interest, without paying compensation, only after a justification process subject to judicial review.

Mr. Trump and his allies have for years echoed the grievances of Afrikaners. During his first term, Mr. Trump directed the State Department to investigate land seizures and “the large-scale killing of farmers.” Elon Musk, who was born in South Africa but is not of Afrikaner descent, has also falsely claimed that white farmers in South Africa were being killed every day.

Despite the claims, white people own half of South Africa’s land while making up just 7 percent of the country’s population. Police statistics do not show that they are any more vulnerable to violent crime than other people in the nation.

Ernst Roets, the former executive director of the Afrikaner Foundation, which lobbies for international support of the interests of Afrikaners, said many of his peers felt seen by Mr. Trump.

But he said the creation of the new refugee program had elicited debate among Afrikaners. Many do not want to leave their home, Mr. Roets said, but want the United States to back their efforts to claim “self-governance” in South Africa.

“I don’t know anyone — no one I’m aware of — that plans to move to America,” Mr. Roets said. “People who want to come to America, we would support that. If people want to relocate to America, the farmers or Afrikaners, we think they would make good Americans.”

“There’s a good fit,” he added.

Zumbe Baruti, a Congolese refugee living in South Carolina, said he spent decades in a refugee camp in Africa waiting for his turn to be accepted.

“Those white Africans are allowed to enter the United States, but Black Africans are denied entry to the United States,” Mr. Baruti, 29, said in Swahili. He said the pivot away from refugees who have waited in camps for years and to Afrikaners was a form of “discrimination.”

Mr. Baruti, a member of the Bembe people in the Democratic Republic of Congo, fled ethnic violence in the nation when he was a child. He was granted refugee status in 2023, but his wife and three children — the oldest 6 years old and the youngest just 2 — had yet to clear security vetting. He entered the United States two years ago, focused on getting a job, saving money and immediately applying for his family to join him.

When he entered, he said he was told by advisers helping him with his application that his family would most likely join him in two years.

He said that seemed unlikely as Mr. Trump turned his focus elsewhere.

“Regarding my family,” Mr. Baruti said, “hope has diminished.”

News

Trump threatens secondary tariffs on Russian oil if no deal on Ukraine

Published

8 hours ago

March 30, 2025

Press Room

Trump threatens secondary tariffs on Russian oil if no deal on Ukraine

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Donald Trump said he was “pissed off” with Vladimir Putin for foot-dragging in talks over a ceasefire with Ukraine, as the US president threatened secondary tariffs on buyers of Russian oil if no deal is done.

Trump’s comments on Sunday revealed the frustration at the White House with the Russian president as negotiations over a settlement of the war in Ukraine continue on without a clear breakthrough.

The new threat to hit imports from countries that purchase Russian oil come as Trump prepares to impose tariffs on goods from many of America’s largest trading partners on Wednesday. The president has proclaimed the moment “liberation day”, but the plan has caused turmoil in markets and anxiety among businesses and governments worldwide.

Trump’s outburst at Moscow is a shift in tone for the US president, who for weeks blamed Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president, for being reluctant to strike a deal.

The US president chided Putin for attacking Zelenskyy’s legitimacy as Kyiv’s leader.

“If we’re in the midst of a negotiation, you could say that I was very angry, pissed off . . . when Putin started getting into Zelenskyy’s credibility,” Trump told NBC News. “That’s not going in the right location, you understand?”

While Ukraine has agreed to American demands for a full 30-day ceasefire, Russia has rebuffed the plan and conceded only to a truce regarding energy infrastructure targets and maritime operations in the Black Sea — and only if the west first lifts sanctions on some agricultural goods.

Zelenskyy has accused Russia of breaking the energy ceasefire at least twice since it was agreed. “Russia must be forced into peace — only pressure will work,” he said this weekend.

Finnish President Alexander Stubb, right. with Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago on Saturday © Finnish Presidential Office/Instagram/Reuters

Finland’s president Alexander Stubb, who spent seven hours with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort on Saturday including a round of golf, told the Financial Times the US president was “running out of patience” with Putin over the ceasefire.

“I think we’re moving in the right direction,” said Stubb on a visit to London where he will on Monday debrief British prime minister Keir Starmer on his discussions with Trump.

Stubb said he had proposed setting a deadline of April 20 — which marks three months since Trump returned to the White House — to accept a 30-day unconditional truce on land, sea and in the air. Both western and eastern Christian churches will celebrate Easter on April 20 this year, a rare calendar alignment.

“The Russians are stalling, they’re coming up with new conditions,” Stubb said. “Let’s call Putin’s bluff for what it is. Russia at this stage does not want peace. So we need to force peace on Russia.”

Trump had previously threatened Russia with new tariffs and sanctions if it resisted an agreement, but expanding the trade bluster to buyers of Russian oil in other countries will add more pressure on Putin.

“If a deal isn’t made, and if I think it was Russia’s fault, I’m going to put secondary sanctions on Russia,” Trump told NBC.

Trump did not offer a clear explanation of what the plan would involve. He said “anybody buying oil from Russia will not be able to sell their product, any product, not just oil, into the United States”, but also said there would be a “25 to 50-point tariff on all oil”.

The US president added that he would slap “secondary tariffs” on Iran if they failed to make a deal on its nuclear programme, as he renewed his threat of “bombing” Tehran if they did not strike an agreement.

News

Iran rejects direct nuke talks as Trump threatens 'bombing' – DW – 03/30/2025

Published

9 hours ago

March 30, 2025

Press Room

Iran rejects direct nuke talks as Trump threatens 'bombing' – DW – 03/30/2025

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Sunday rebuked the idea of direct negotiations with US President Donald Trump’s administration over its nuclear program.

Pezeshkian: US must ‘build trust’ after earlier breached promises

“We responded to the US president’s letter via Oman and rejected the option of direct talks, but we are open to indirect negotiations,” Pezeshkian said during a sitdown with his cabinet broadcast on Iranian TV.

“We don’t avoid talks; it’s the breach of promises that has caused issues for us so far,” Pezeshkian said. “They must prove that they can build trust.”

During Trump’s first term in 2018, he pulled the US out of a nuclear agreement with Iran known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

Iran and Russia look to forge stronger ties against West

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That deal provided sanctions relief for Iran, with the Iranian government in exchange curbing its nuclear program and allowing inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency to periodically view its enrichment sites. France, Germany, Russia, the UK and the EU are some of the other parties signed onto the JCPOA.

Trump vows ‘bombing’ if no new Iran nuclear deal

Trump sent a letter to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei earlier this month, urging Iran to reach a new nuclear deal with the US in his second term in the White House.

In an interview with US broadcaster NBC News, Trump made new threats towards Iran if there is no new nuclear agreement with the US.

“If they don’t make a deal,” Trump told the outlet on Saturday evening, referring to Iran. “There will be bombing. It will be bombing the likes of which they have never seen before.”

Trump claimed that representatives from the US and Iran are “talking” on the matter.

Trump orders strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen

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The Trump administration has a “maximum pressure” approach towards Iran, which aims to both economically and politically isolate Tehran.

The Trump administration has also vowed to crack down on so-called Iranian proxies in the Middle East region, with the US currently attacking the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen.

Edited by: Roshni Majumdar