The Excerpt podcast: House approves bill on TikTok that would force a sale or ban

On Thursday's episode of The Excerpt podcast: USA TODAY Congress and Campaigns Reporter Riley Beggin reports on the House approval of a TikTok bill that would force a sale or effectively ban the company. A Georgia judge has dismissed six charges in the Trump election racketeering case as too vague. The portion of U.S. adults identifying as LGBTQ has more than doubled in the last 12 years. USA TODAY Breaking News Reporter Claire Thornton explains how some school districts are working to help teachers find housing. Why do women go through menopause? Scientists find clues in a study of whales.

Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

Podcasts: True crime, in-depth interviews and more USA TODAY podcasts right here

Taylor Wilson:

Good morning. I'm Taylor Wilson, and today is Thursday, March 14th, 2024. This is The Excerpt. Today, the murky future of TikTok in the US. Plus, a Georgia judge dismisses several charges in the Trump election racketeering case. And we take a look at how some school districts are helping teachers with housing.

♦

The House has approved a Bill targeting TikTok, putting the future of the popular app in the United States up in the air. I caught up with USA Today congress and campaigns reporter, Riley Beggin, for the latest. Riley, thanks for hopping on The Excerpt today.

Riley Beggin:

Of course.

Taylor Wilson:

So the house approved this TikTok Bill yesterday. What would it functionally do Riley, and why do proponents say it's necessary?

Riley Beggin:

It's been described often as a ban, but that's not exactly what it would do. It would essentially force the parent company of TikTok, which is called ByteDance, to sell the app within around six months. And if they do not do that, they would be banned in the United States and essentially it would be deplatformed, prevented from being shared on the app stores and stuff like that.

And the argument for it, ByteDance is a Beijing based company. It's a Chinese company. So TikTok has an American subsidiary, but lawmakers that have concerns about this are worried about the Chinese government's potential influence over American's data here. Some people are worried about propaganda going through the app and influencing Americans and then other national security risks.

Taylor Wilson:

And this vote passed overwhelmingly in the House, but a group of House lawmakers have warned against a ban like this. What's their argument, Riley?

Riley Beggin:

There were about 65 people who voted against the Bill in the House. Their explanations really run the gamut. So something that we hear a lot is First Amendment concerns, worried that it'd be restricting American's freedom of speech. People have said that this process was rushed. It just passed through committee late last week. People have said it's bad policy, that instead we should have actual standards for social media companies, that we should be doing more for data privacy.

And then another thing is concerns that it could hurt small businesses because a lot of people make money on TikTok. The people who voted against this really ran the gamut. We had really progressive lawmakers like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar, and really conservative members like Marjorie Taylor-Greene that voted against it. The House intelligence chair, Jim Himes voted against it. Nancy Mace cited constitutional issues. So a wide range of people. You don't see them all agreeing that often.

Taylor Wilson:

So what does TikTok say about these concerns over user data and what does this lobbying campaign from them look like in recent weeks?

Riley Beggin:

TikTok has been really pushing back. They have prompted their users to call members of Congress and tell them to oppose the Bill. There are lots of members who have told us that they think that that approach backfired. Top influencers on the platform have come to the capitol to speak with lawmakers. There was a protest outside the Capitol yesterday when the House Bill passed. And then this week the CEO of TikTok came to the hill to speak with lawmakers.

And there are some senators who have said, "No, I'm not going to meet with him." And then TikTok says, your data's safe with us. They say TikTok stores. It's American user data in the United States that it's managed solely by a US-based data security team since mid 2022. There has been some reporting that has indicated that that may not be the whole picture. The data of paid content creators is stored on servers in China according to reporting by Forbes from last year. So there are a couple ways to look at that claim.

Taylor Wilson:

So Riley, the Bill now, of course, needs the Senate to pass. What are you hearing about its chances there in that chamber and what's next going forward?

Riley Beggin:

I would say for the most part, senators share the concerns of the folks in the house about the national security vulnerabilities here. But there's definitely less of a unanimous agreement for the Bill. The two top senators on the intelligence committee, Mark Warner and Marco Rubio, conservative Senator Josh Hawley, the number two Republican in the Senate, John Thune have all said that they are for this.

But at the same time, there are a lot of senators who have raised other concerns. They're worried that the House Bill might not be legal. For President Trump tried to ban TikTok when he was president and the courts blocked him, so that's the backdrop of a lot of people's thoughts about this. There's conversations about alternative solutions like making it easier for the Commerce Department to regulate foreign apps. And then Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky has said he would block speedy passage.

They need unanimous consent, all 100 votes in the Senate to avoid moving through the multi-day process of considering legislation. He said to me, in a free country, you don't take people's companies. He thinks it violates the First Amendment. So he is, at the very least, going to do his best to stop it. President Biden has said that he would sign this Bill if it got to his desk. So if it makes it through the Senate, then the indications are good that the president would support it.

Taylor Wilson:

It. Riley Beggin covers congress and campaigns for USA Today. Great update for us here. Thanks Riley.

Riley Beggin:

Of course, thanks for having me.

♦

Taylor Wilson:

The Georgia Judge presiding over former president Donald Trump's case for allegedly trying to steal the 2020 election dismissed six charges yesterday. Fulton County Judge, Scott McAfee, did so because they were not specific enough against Trump and several co-defendants. He dismissed charges alleging they asked public officials to violate their oaths of office by switching presidential electors from those for President Joe Biden who won Georgia to Trump.

Still the judge left 35 charges in place in the indictment and he left acts described in the indictment like Trump's call to Georgia Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger, when he asked him to find the votes needed to give him victory in the state. The judge said the acts could still be alleged as part of the conspiracy. He has not yet scheduled the trial and is also considering whether to disqualify Fulton County District Attorney, Fannie Willis, and special prosecutor, Nathan Wade, from the case.

♦

The portion of US adults who identify as other than heterosexual has more than doubled since 2012. According to a gala poll, about 7.6% of adults in the country identify as LGBTQ+ or something other than heterosexual. That's compared to around 5.5% four years ago and 3.5% in 2012. That was the year the National Polling Agency began measuring sexual orientation and transgender identity. The author said that if trends continue, the share of LGBTQ+ adults in the US will exceed 10% within the next 30 years.

Brandon Robinson, an associate professor and department chair of gender and sexuality studies at the University of California Riverside said the growing numbers show that people sense greater societal acceptance and or support systems for those who identify as LGBTQ+. With rising rents, some school districts around the country are trying to find teachers affordable housing. I spoke with USA Today breaking news reporter, Claire Thornton, for more. Claire, thanks for hopping on The Excerpt today.

Claire Thornton:

Thanks for having me, Taylor.

Taylor Wilson:

So Claire, how big of an issue is unaffordable housing for teachers?

Claire Thornton:

It is a quite enormous issue. Housing prices have gone up everywhere and even in school districts where teacher salaries have increased in the last couple of years, economic data shows that the salary increases have not increased nearly enough to keep up with rising housing costs. And so districts are having a hard time recruiting teachers. And at the same time, rising housing costs are pushing teachers out of some school districts.

Taylor Wilson:

So Claire, some school districts are now building housing for their teachers. What does this look like and what are some of the districts that are doing this?

Claire Thornton:

It is a very complicated process. But in the end, when a school district is actually able to have some rental apartment units available for district staff, not a lot, but some, they're able to offer it at less than half of market rate. So that means paying as little as $800 a month or a thousand dollars a month for a one bedroom in California. But it takes years to get to that point.

Districts have to cobble together different funding from anything they have that they can use to build and get money often from the city and other nonprofit sources. Very, very few school districts, a very small minority actually have teacher housing in the US. But many more are considering it.

Taylor Wilson:

And Claire, you talked about some of the complications here. In particular, it's curious when a teacher's employer then becomes their landlord as well. Can you talk about that complication?

Claire Thornton:

One district leader who I spoke to in California said it's like a dorm for teachers. But he said that that criticism, he has only ever heard that from teachers who don't live in the teacher housing, who have their own housing. And he said that because of the below market rates that their district is able to offer, that people who are in those units are really glad they're there.

School districts have not historically been in the business of creating housing and housing advocates and education advocates have said it's not good that we've gotten to this point that school districts have become the backstop against America's insane housing crisis. Schools don't really have extra time and energy to be creating housing, but they're doing it because they feel like they have no other choice.

Taylor Wilson:

So Claire, what other solutions are on the horizon? Is this a matter of just paying teachers more or what else is being discussed?

Claire Thornton:

It is a yes and scenario. Advocates and experts and district leaders who I spoke to said that teacher salaries across the board absolutely need to be raised. Teachers are not making enough to make ends meet. But because of the way school districts are funded in the US, in many cases, teacher salaries are set and allocated based on a limited amount of tax revenue.

So even if a district had all the intention in the world of raising teacher salaries, there's only so much they can do to put more money in the hands of teachers. Because of the way our education system is structured, it's a yes and situation because even with teacher raises that have been able to benefit teachers, it's still not enough for them to afford market rate housing.

Taylor Wilson:

Claire Thornton covers poverty and social services for USA Today. Great insight as always, Claire. Thanks so much.

Claire Thornton:

Thanks, Taylor.

♦

Taylor Wilson:

The existence of menopause in humans has long been a biological conundrum, but scientists are now getting a better understanding from whales. Findings of a new study suggests that menopause gives an evolutionary advantage to grandmother whale's grandchildren. A paper published yesterday in the Journal Nature looked at 32 whale species, five of which undergo menopause. In those species, researchers finding suggests that menopause evolved so that grandmothers could help their daughters' offspring without competing with them for mates.

♦

Those findings support what's known as the grandmother hypothesis. It states that menopause is evolutionarily useful because while older women are no longer able to have children, they can instead focus their efforts on supporting their children and grandchildren. This means their family lines are more likely to survive. You can read more with a link in today's show notes. And be sure to stay tuned to The Excerpt later today when my co-host Dana Taylor talks with Kenneth Miller, professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Rutgers University, about how living right on the water on the Eastern seaboard might be a riskier venture than you thought.

♦

You could find the episode right here on this feed beginning at 4:00 PM Eastern time. And today is PI Day celebrating the mathematical constant known as PI. It's marked on March 14th since PI is typically rounded to 3.14. It can actually go on forever though the most accurate value according to Guinness World Records, is more than 62 trillion digits.

♦

Thanks for listening to The Excerpt. You can get the podcast wherever you get your audio. And if you're on a smart speaker, just ask for The Excerpt. I'm Taylor Wilson, back tomorrow with more of The Excerpt from USA Today.