Kyle Shideler, the Director for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism at the Center for Security Policy, believes governors should do more than ban TikTok, and divest their states' pension funds from Chinese companies.
"This rash of having governors ban tik-tok on employee phones is fine. It’s not world changing but it’s positive," Shideler wrote Dec. 14 on Twitter. "Now when governors start divesting state pension funds for Chinese companies. Then we’re talking."
According to a story by National Public Radio (NPR), several governors have ordered their state agencies to prohibit the video-sharing app from being downloaded and used on state-issued devices, citing security risks related to ByteDance, TikTok's Chinese-owned parent company. South Dakota, South Carolina, Nebraska, Maryland, Utah, Idaho, Alabama, and Georgia all have issued notices to state agencies banning the app, which is already prohibited by the U.S. military.
"Protecting Alabamians' right to privacy is a must, and I surely don't take a security threat from China lightly," Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey wrote on Twitter. "That's why I have banned the use of the TikTok app on our state devices and network." A bill that would ban TikTok from devices issued by federal agencies recently passed the Senate by unanimous vote, NPR reported.
In a memo sent to the heads of various state agencies, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp wrote that about 100 million Americans use TikTok, which "has the capability to track and store its users' highly detailed public and non-public personal information, and the Chinese government is able to access this information under national security laws that require Chinese companies to assist China in intelligence work through data sharing and other means. This requirement has already resulted in the CCP influencing TikTok's content and censorship algorithms to further its own political interests and poses an ongoing threat to the data of all users," WABE's Rahul Bali wrote on Twitter.
Several states' public pension funds are invested in Chinese-owned companies such as Alibaba, although some have begun to reduce those investments, citing concerns over inflation and the possibility of military conflict between China and Taiwan, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported in October.
Florida's public-worker fund has stopped new investments in Chinese companies, and the $183 billion Teacher Retirement System of Texas voted in September to cut its investment in Chinese companies from 3% to approximately 1.5%, WSJ reported. Other states haven't made plans to divest public funds from China. North Carolina Treasurer Dale Folwell is in charge of a state pension fund worth $110 billion, but he said those funds won't be divested from Chinese companies any time soon.
“It’s the second-largest economy in the world,” he said.
Consumer Research sent a letter last year to the governors of the 10 states with the largest pension investments in BlackRock, which has close ties to China. The letter, which was sent to the governors of Washington, Florida, New York, Nevada, Nebraska, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Montana, and West Virginia, warned officials that "BlackRock is taking their money and betting on China. In so doing they are putting American security at risk, along with billions of dollars from U.S. investors, including many state-run pension plans."
The letter also emphasized "BlackRock’s unabashed gusto for Chinese markets" and highlighted the ties between BlackRock CEO Larry Fink and leaders of the Chinese Communist Party.
