McCaul Applauds A&M Decision to Block TikTok on Campus Wi-Fi

WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Congressman Michael McCaul (R-Texas), chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, released the following statement on Texas A&M’s decision to block access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks. Yesterday, Rep. McCaul released a statement on the University of Texas’s decision to do the same, and he urged other schools to follow suit.

“The CCP will use any means at their disposal to infiltrate America’s best universities. Texas A&M’s decision to ban TikTok on campus Wi-Fi will help stop the CCP in their tracks, prohibiting them from exploiting students’ data and stealing valuable research. I urge other universities to take this threat as seriously as Texas schools like A&M and UT, which continue to set an example for the rest of the nation.”

Background:

In 2018, at the urging of Reps. McCaul and Henry Cuellar (D-Texas), Texas A&M terminated its partnership with Confucius Institutes — centers funded and backed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Rep. McCaul has also been sounding the alarm about the threat from TikTok since 2019. He applauded Governor Abbott’s decision to ban the app on government devices in December. And he urged other Texas schools to follow UT’s decision to block the app on campus Wi-Fi.

###