Republican senators prepare hard-line approach to Trump's stance on China, TikTok:

The 11th and now 12-hour drama swirling around TikTok has angered Republican senators, who met yesterday at D.C.'s Jefferson Hotel for a Sunday lunch and a follow-up dinner a few hours later.

Sources at the meeting told Fox Business that the senators expressed solidarity and said the national security threat posed by the Chinese-owned social media app is “about as serious as it gets.” There are concerns that President Donald Trump “does not understand the law and may not be prepared for the strong insistence he will hear from the Republican side” that the “deliver or ban” rule must be followed.

Fox Business has learned that top GOP senators, including Tom Cotton (R), Lindsey Graham (R), Tom Tillis (R) and Rick Scott (Calif.), have attended events hosted by billionaire Frank McCourt. They participated. Jr. and venture capitalist Kevin O'Leary. McCourt and O'Leary lead the team that made a $20 billion bid to TikTok's parent company, ByteDance, to acquire the platform's US operations. According to reports, their proposal is only approved by the Ministry of Justice.

Rep. John Molnar (R-MI), who has been tapped to fill Mike Gallagher's (R-WI) vacancy on the House Select Committee on the Communist Party of China, also attended the events, sources said.

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Almost all of the lawmakers present had attended a closed-door briefing last March detailing TikTok's reach and reach. The briefing fueled a rare bipartisan push that led to a bill that would have required TikTok to spin off its U.S. division into a U.S. entity. to sell, otherwise it will be completely banned.

While the contents of the confidential briefing have not been released, Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., told reporters as he left the March meeting. “My reaction to this briefing is that TikTok is a gun pointed at the head of the American people,” he added. They potentially target that information and use it through algorithms. The Core of American Democracy.”

Senator Cotton warned Apple, Microsoft and Google that they could face “devastating bankruptcy” if they ignore the Tiktok ban.

Sources close to the situation said Senator Graham and Senator Cotton were particularly outspoken during Sunday's hearings, insisting that US app hosts, including Apple, Google, Microsoft and Amazon, which distribute the service, could be faced with “destructive liability”. the law

The law states that web hosting providers must terminate their relationship with the platform or face a daily fine of $5,000 for each user still able to access the service. This fine can quickly add up to billions of dollars.

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Senator Cotton later to X Thanks for posting both And a warning to App Store sites. “We applaud Amazon, Apple, Google, and Microsoft for following the law and ceasing operations with ByteDance and TikTok, and we encourage other companies to do the same. However, this law risks bankruptcy.” It spells doom for any company that violates it.” It is added separately“Any company that hosts, distributes, services or otherwise facilitates the Communist-controlled TikTok could face hundreds of billions of dollars in damages under the law, not only from the Department of Justice, but also under securities law, shareholder lawsuits, And state AG companies, think about it.

While TikTok has restored access to the platform, none of the hosting providers have made the app available for download.

Cotton, a Harvard-educated lawyer, also noted that President Trump has not been sworn in until the Jan. 19 deadline and is therefore in no position to “extend” the time before the ban takes effect.

In X he wrote“Now that the law has gone into effect, there is no legal basis for any kind of 'extension' of its effective date. In order for TikTok to come back online in the future, ByteDance must agree to a sale that meets the legal requirements for a qualified divestiture. Severing all ties between TikTok and Communist China is the only way to protect Americans from the serious threat to their privacy and security posed by the Communist-controlled TikTok.”

Kevin O'Leary warns TikTok's fate could be decided by “secret golden bullet” by giving Beijing veto power

Graham: “China's gold stock companies should be banned or delisted from US exchanges.

After the McCourt-Auley meeting, Senator Graham also used List X with a new plan to delist any Chinese company with so-called “golden share structures.” Golden share is a term for companies in which the Chinese Communist Party and its leader, Xi Jinping, have a significant role and can, in short, control management decisions.

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Graham posted last night: “It's clear that what's known as China's 'golden share structure' is blocking TikTok's rescue.”

If a company has a “golden share structure”, it means that one of the shareholders is Xi Jinping, the head of the Chinese Communist Party. He owns you and makes all the decisions.

I will soon be introducing legislation with my colleagues in the Senate that would prevent any company with a “Chinese golden share” from listing on any US stock exchange, as well as delisting any existing company with a golden share structure from any US exchange. will delete.”

A source at the meeting told Fox Business that the agreement among Republican attendees to follow the law and the Supreme Court ruling that upheld it was “almost unanimous,” adding that “these social media platform owners are out of power.” They are unlimited. (These platforms) distort the results and polarize us unnecessarily.