TIK TOK BOOM: Our Brendan Bordelon has a behind-the-scenes look at the hubris-inflected lobbying failures at TikTok that led to yesterday’s signing of a law to force video app to sell itself or face a U.S. ban. — “Given Washington’s increasingly hostile tone toward China, it may have been impossible for any app owned by a Beijing-based company to duck restrictions indefinitely,” Brendan writes. “But interviews paint a picture of a yearslong series of missteps at TikTok that culminated in this week’s historic defeat on Capitol Hill.” — “They describe a company buoyed by confidence in its runaway commercial success and vast user base, with leaders who failed to recognize that TikTok’s links to China made it more vulnerable than rival tech platforms like Meta, which had gone through the Washington wringer with barely a scratch. ‘They thought they were Mark Zuckerberg, except they weren’t American,’” said one tech expert and former diplomat. — The New York Times’ Sapna Maheshwari, David McCabe and Cecilia Kang, meanwhile, have the perspective from the Hill, where lawmakers huddled in secret for more than a year with each other, the Justice Department and the White House “to avoid setting off TikTok’s lobbying might” and “bulletproof the bill from expected legal challenges.” MORE NEW BUSINESS: A couple more former members of Congress have signed new clients. The journalism advocacy group Freedom of the Press Foundation enlisted former Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-Va.), who’s now at Baker Donelson, to lobby for the PRESS Act, a bipartisan bill to shield journalists from being required to turn over information that could reveal their sources — except for extenuating circumstances — and require the federal government to give journalists the opportunity to respond to demands for their records, documents and other communications. — And Conaway Graves Group, the firm started by former Rep. Mike Conaway (R-Texas), has signed the cryptocurrency company Ripple Labs. The former House Agriculture chair and his firm previously worked for Ripple as a subcontractor of Williams and Jensen, but Ripple Labs and Williams and Jensen parted ways earlier this year, disclosures show. COMING ATTRACTIONS: Bloomberg’s Bill Allison reports that “major U.S. companies could face lawsuits from their own shareholders for making political donations, according to a new legal strategy progressives are advocating to reign in corporate influence on elections.” — “Some of the money used for a corporation’s hefty super PAC donation [comes] from shareholders. That gives those investors standing to sue if they don’t approve of how the money is spent, according to the latest Center for American Progress report, which aims to [rein] in the 2010 Supreme Court Citizens United ruling that allows corporations and other groups to spend unlimited amounts on elections.” — “The strategy — if it ends up resulting in a raft of shareholder lawsuits — could play a major role in the 2024 elections with corporations more cautious to donate. That has the potential to hurt Republicans over Democrats, because their allied super PACs receive more money from key sectors including oil and gas producers, tobacco companies and private prison operators.” U.S. TRAVEL PUSHES BACK ON BIOMETRICS PROPOSAL: The travel industry’s top trade group is mobilizing to block a crackdown on TSA’s use of facial recognition screenings from making it into the FAA reauthorization bill. — The U.S. Travel Association took aim this morning at an amendment from Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and John Kennedy (R-La.) that would halt TSA’s facial recognition screening pilot program and any planned expansions and require sign-off from Congress to resume using biometric screening methods. The lawmakers have cited privacy concerns and insufficient communication to fliers about being able to opt out of the pilot program. — In a statement this morning blasting Merkley and Kennedy’s amendment, U.S. Travel President and CEO Geoff Freeman called the push “misguided” and contended that it would “only succeed in harming security, wasting travelers’ time and costing millions in taxpayer dollars invested in developing state-of-the-art screening technology.” — Freeman pointed to a visit from TSA leaders just yesterday to Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport to tour different biometric screening innovations. “Biometric technology is the future of air traveler screening and it is supported by the traveling public,” he said. FOR YOUR BOOKMARKS BAR: The team over at Monument Advocacy has put together a clickable roadmap for what’s shaping up to be a wild six months in Washington ahead of November’s elections. Their calendar highlights the slew of key dates coming up, from when things like the FAA and farm bills expire to the possible dates of former President Donald Trump’s various trials, Fed meetings, party conventions, the Paris Olympics and more. SPOTTED at a RightNOW Women “speed mentoring” reception on Wednesday night hosted by Susan Hirschmann of Williams and Jensen, per a tipster: Johnson and Johnson's Jane Adams, The Business Council's Marlene Colucci, Angel Enterprises PR's Shelley Hymes, Hilton's Beth Jafari, Jen Jett of Sen. Roger Wicker’s (R-Miss.) office, Fundraising Inc.'s Alexandra Kendrick, Mary Rosado of Rep. Andy Barr’s (R-Ky.) office and Leidos' Amy Smith. — And at the Phillies-Reds game on Monday at Great American Ball Park in Cincinnati, per a LinkedIn post from Squire Patton Boggs’ Tommy Andrews: Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) and chief of staff Brent Robertson watching with Kroger lobbyist Matt Perin and Andrews, who represents Kroger. (Marshall, of course, is one of the co-sponsors of and has been a major advocate of one of Kroger's top priorities, the Credit Card Competition Act.) At the game, Marshall caught a foul ball and gave it to a young child, which "made his day at the game," one attendee told Daniel.
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