TikTok and political social media influencers, who were invited to the White House last week, are surprised that President Joe Biden and congressional Democrats have approved the bill to ban the popular video social media app.
The House voted 352-65 on Wednesday in favor of the bill that would ban the app, with only 50 Democrats and 15 Republicans voting against it.
Keith Edwards, an influencer with over 14,000 followers on TikTok, said it was not a good look for Biden, who continues to struggle with young voters.
“It’s not going to have an electoral impact because voters don’t see things as real until they actually happen,” he said in an interview with DailyMail.com
“But it’s not great we’re talking about this when Joe Biden had finally shifted the mood for him in a positive direction.”
Social media influencer Keith Edwards told the Daily Mail that Biden and the Democrats were sending the wrong message to young people
Gen Z activist and TikToker Johnny Palmadessa said he relied on the platform to communicate with young people
Biden’s outreach to over 70 different social media influencers for the State of the Union address last week sent the message to content creators that he and his campaign were serious about wooing young people on TikTok and other social media platforms.
Edwards said he wasn’t worried about losing the TikTok platform entirely, but warned political content creators to spread their influence across multiple platforms.
‘TikTok is not going away. Someone will buy it, but creators need to spread their bets, because between this, Meta’s incoming shadow ban on political content, and Elon Musk destroying Twitter … you can’t just rely on one platform anymore,” he said.
Edwards has over 90,000 followers on Meta’s Threads platform and 136,000 followers on X.
White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters that Biden continued to support the bill that would ban the app and would sign it if it reached his desk.
“We hope the Senate takes action and takes this up very quickly,” Jean-Pierre told reporters on Air Force One.
Gen Z activist Johnny Palmadessa, who has 26,000 followers on TikTok, also expressed surprise after House Democrats joined Republicans to pass the bill that would force TikTok’s China-based company ByteDance to sell the app or ban it in the United States.
“TikTok is connecting young Americans with opportunity — and as a Gen-Z TikToker, I find myself dependent on the platform for communication,” he told the Daily Mail. “This just underscores the disconnect of Congress in making decisions they already don’t understand.”
Palmadessa was also at the White House event last week and has over 100,000 followers on threads and 16,000 followers on Instagram.
“Instead of trying to ban a platform that lifts up young Americans: Congress should focus on pursuing an agenda that also supports young people,” he said.
News that the House passed the TikTok bill sparked protests against the popular video app from political content creators.
TikTok creators expressed their anger at Democrats and Biden for supporting the bill that would ban the app
“I think this legislation and others like it – especially around AI, which is also coming – is where leftists and conservatives will find common ground,” said V. Spehar, who writes on the handle @underthedesknews to the DailyMail. com.
Spehar issued a protest video on his account just after the House passed the bill to address TikTok by a bipartisan vote of 352-65.
Spehar pointed out that Republicans such as Reps. Dan Bishop (R-NC) and Thomas Massie (R-KY) had real concerns about the legislation and ridiculed Rep. Nancy Pelosi for her comment that it would make TikTok ‘Tic-Tac-Toe. A winner.’
“I think Nancy Pelosi failed in her attempt to convince voters that she ‘as a grandmother’ gets it,” Spehar said.
TikTok user @probably_n0t_chris spoke out in a video about Biden’s hypocrisy
TikTok user @probably_n0t_chris vented in a video on TikTok highlighting Biden’s hypocrisy for using TikTok influencers to promote his State of the Union speech before approving a ban on the app less than 24 hours later.
‘If this isn’t proof that these politicians will use you and throw you aside the moment they get what they want? I don’t know what is?’ he said. ‘To the 70 influencers who left, if you feel half as stupid as you should, you will remember this decision for the rest of your f****g life. What did you expect? This guy brought you on to further your own unemployment. I hope you feel bloody stupid, this is Joe Biden we’re talking about.’
The Biden campaign created a TikTok account in February to engage with young people and share exclusive videos of the president.
President Biden digitally salutes content creators at the White House
TikTok’s creators march from the US capital to the White House and demand that President Biden keep TikTok, during a rally in Washington DC, USA,
TikTok user Gabrielle Judge revealed in a TikTok video that she was invited by the White House to participate in the State of the Union address, but she was “on the fence” about the idea as her content was not necessarily political.
She indicated she was repulsed after she saw Biden say he would sign the bill banning TikTok if Congress puts it on his desk.
“After Biden has been using TikTok to campaign for certain things recently, I was like you’re full of c*** anyway,” she said in a video.
Judge revealed that the agency recruiting influencers for the State of the Union address sent her concept briefs, approved talking points for posts and videos about the event an hour before the event took place.
Dommer said she had about 400,000 followers across various platforms.
“If you think about my size of following, I was invited to this to basically boost Joe Biden and his vote,” she said.
Late. Josh Hawley (R-MO) mocked Biden on social media after the White House reiterated the president’s support for the bill.
“Maybe the president could lead by example and cancel his TikTok account,” he wrote on X.