Donald Trump calls TikTok 'national security threat', Facebook 'enemy of the people'

While acknowledging on Monday that he believes the Chinese-owned social media platform TikTok poses a threat to national security, former president Donald Trump contended that outlawing the app would only strengthen Facebook, which he referred to as an "enemy of the people".

“I do believe that,” Trump told CNBC’s chat show Squawk Box in response to a question about him previously deeming TikTok a national security threat, according to the New York Post.

“I do believe it and we very much have to go into privacy and make sure that we are protecting the American people’s privacy and data rights,” the presumptive Republican nominee added. “But, you know, we also have that problem with other — you have that problem with Facebook and lots of other companies too.”

Then, according to Trump, the decision to ban TikTok is a "tough one to make," and Facebook would only benefit from the popular app's removal.

“Frankly there are a lot of people on TikTok that love it. There are a lot of young kids on TikTok who will go crazy without it,” he said. “There are a lot of users, that is, you know a lot of good, and there’s a lot of bad with TikTok, but the thing I don’t like, is without TikTok, you can make Facebook bigger — and I consider Facebook to be an enemy of the people, along with a lot of the media," he said.

“If you ban TikTok, Facebook and others, but mostly Facebook, will be a big beneficiary,” he added, arguing Facebook has been “very bad for the country” especially in terms of elections.