Former President Donald Trump has said he believes TikTok is a threat to national security, but he can’t support Congress. bans the popular program because doing so would increase support for Facebook, an “enemy of the people”.
In an interview on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” Monday morning, Trump said, “I do,” when asked if he believed TikTok was a national security threat.
“I believe that, and we have to recognize that we are protecting the privacy and information rights of the American people,” he said.
Trump initially supported efforts to ban the app in the US, but recently withdrew its support. Explaining why he flipped, Trump said he could ban TikTok during his presidency, but left it up to Congress.
“But as you know, I was at the point where I could do it if I wanted to. I should have said you decide, you make this decision, because there are a lot of people who like it,” he said. “TikTok has a lot of young kids who would go crazy without it. There are many users.”
Trump later claimed that banning TikTok would lead to the growth of Facebook, which he described as an “enemy of the people”.
“TikTok has a lot of good and a lot of bad. But what I don’t like is that you can grow Facebook without TikTok, and I consider Facebook, along with many other media, to be the enemy of the people,” he said.