Ted Cruz was questioning Michael Beckerman, Vice President and head of public policy at TikTok, and blasted him for being evasive and refusing to answer his question about Beijing ByteDance.
Cruz was asking a very specific question, wanting to know whether Beijing ByteDance Technology was an affiliate of TikTok as defined in their privacy policy. But Beckerman simply wouldn’t answer the question directly.
After some back and forth where Beckerman did everything he could to evade the question, including claiming he’d already answered it, Cruz finally dropped a bomb on him:
So you’re refusing to answer the question. That does not give this committee any confidence that TikTok is doing anything other than participating in Chinese propaganda and espionage on American children.
Beckerman objected to Cruz’s statement, claiming it wasn’t accurate. But Cruz hit right back:
If it were not accurate you would answer the question. You have dodged the questions more than any witness I have seen in my nine years serving in the Senate. That is saying something because witnesses often try and dodge questions. But you answer non-sequiturs and refuse to answer very simple questions. That, in my experience, when a witness does that, it is because they are hiding something.
Cruz ended there, took a swig of his water and that was the end of the questioning.
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