IT GIVES THE GOVERNMENT AUTHORITY OVER ALL FORMS OF COMMUNICATION DOMESTIC OR ABROAD

The Senate boasts that the Restricting the Emergence of Security Threats that Risk Information and Communications Technology (“RESTRICT”) Act targets China’s TikTok.

Then why doesn’t the bill name TikTok?

That’s because it includes all forms of communication, mainly technology from China, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia, and Venezuela.

“The RESTRICT Act comprehensively addresses the ongoing threat posed by technology from foreign adversaries by better empowering the Department of Commerce to review, prevent, and mitigate ICT transactions that pose undue risk, protecting the US supply chain now and into the future,” Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), the bill’s sponsor, wrote in a press release.

All in the name of national security. It’s another freaking Patriot Act. It’s an act that gives the executive branch way too much power. The bill allows the Secretary of Commerce to review and prohibit certain transactions between persons in the United States and foreign adversaries, and for other purposes.”

The bill identifies other “relevant executive department and agency heads” who will have a role: Secretaries of Treasury, State, Defense, and Homeland Security, attorney general, U.S. trade representative, director of National Intelligence, administrator of general services, and FCC chairman.