Democrats Worry Crackdown on TikTok Could Hurt Party

[Celerity]

9. TikTok, which has about 150 million users in the United States, has become a mainstay in many

people’s lives. The wildly successful algorithm serves videos to multitudes of people who might not otherwise view them, propelling nobodies to stardom and turning small businesses into profit machines. The app, which attracted more visitors than Google last year, has done much to reshape American culture, especially for younger generations.

“Ditching something that has proven to be incredibly helpful to winning elections is like shooting yourself in the foot,” said Aidan Kohn-Murphy, the 19-year-old founder of Gen-Z for Change, a coalition of creators formerly known as TikTok for Biden.

Kohn-Murphy and Victor Shi, strategy director for Voters of Tomorrow, a group also aimed at Gen Z, said numerous Democratic campaigns have expressed interest in cultivating relationships with creators of TikTok content, building on the 2020 and 2022 election cycles. “For any campaign that wants to get their message out to young people, I don’t think you can do that without TikTok,” Shi said.

That’s where the potential problems come in for Democrats, whose reliance on younger voters has only become greater with the ascendance of politically potent issues such as abortion rights, climate change, racial equity and gun control.