Fox’s Varney, Compagno Warn Attempts to Ban TikTok Will Mobilize Democrats: ‘Not in the GOP’s Favor’

Fox’s Stuart Varney and Emily Compagno agreed that attempts to ban TikTok in the United States are highly likely to fail and will only succeed in galvanizing Democrats who use the video platform.

Compagno joined Varney on his Fox Business show to discuss the lawsuit TikTok filed against Montana after banning downloads of the app statewide. The lawsuit decries the ban as a violation of free speech, and the case is likely to have broader repercussions for the effort to ban TikTok nationally over concerns the app gathers users’ data for a company owned by the Chinese government.

When Varney asked Compagno if a ban on TikTok is legally feasible, she replied, “The short answer, frankly, is no.”

“I think Montana has a greater uphill battle than our federal government, but the bottom line is that First Amendment will likely trump any governmental security concerns because we are not at that smoking gun level that we were with Huawei… We essentially have to show an exceptional government interest in order to trump First Amendment. That’s a really high bar.”

Compagno added that the challenge in surmounting TikTok’s First Amendment protections is increased by the fact that “the genie is too far out of the bottle with the millions of users that use it” already. Varney then floated a hypothetical scenario where Republicans are able to ban TikTok nationwide and added, “I think an awful lot of young people and business owners would vote Democrat because they use TikTok and they like TikTok. And they don’t think it’s a big security concern for them.”

Compagno agreed that would be a “convenient talking point for the Left that they would harness for votes.” While Compagno noted how Democrats have scrutinized TikTok as well, she warned that the matter “can be whittled down to a soundbite, a headline, and that’s not in the GOP’s favor.”

Watch above via Fox Business.