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Both of Utah's Republican senators have differing thoughts on the TikTok bill the House of Representatives passed on Wednesday.

The bill — which Sen. Mike Lee opposes and Sen. Mitt Romney supports — would require ByteDance to sell TikTok, and if the company doesn't sell the app, it would no longer be available in app stores.

“Senator Lee wants to prevent the CCP from accessing our data through TikTok, but is concerned that the current bill gives too much power to the executive branch to ban or control companies they don’t like,” Billy Gribbin, Lee's director of communications, told the Deseret News.

Romney's support of the bill comes down to his belief that the app “shouldn’t be owned by the Chinese government” and his concern that TikTok could potentially play a role in election interference, he told KUTV.

“We’ve seen how they’ve used it in other elections, particularly in Taiwan, to send propaganda before the elections, to gather information about the users,” he said. “That’s not something we want the Chinese Communist Party to be able to do.”

If the bill is signed into law, the app already has buyers waiting in the wings, including “Shark Tank” investor and O’Leary Ventures chairman Kevin O’Leary and an investment group formed by former treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin.

Sen. Tommy Tuberville endorses Trent Staggs in race to replace Sen. Mitt Romney

Riverton Mayor Trent Staggs just got a boost in his campaign to replace Sen. Mitt Romney.

On Friday, Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville visited Utah and endorsed Staggs, saying he needs “a Trump guy” like Staggs.

“There’s a difference between a Republican and a conservative Christian Republican which needs to be in Washington, D.C., like Trent Staggs,” Tuberville said.

Staggs was the first major candidate to announce his campaign – four months before Romney announced he would not seek reelection. He now is in a race against 10 other candidates, including 3rd District Rep. John Curtis, former state House Speaker Brad Wilson, conservative activist Carolyn Phippen and Brent Hatch, the son of the late Sen. Orrin Hatch.

During Friday's speech at the Faith Baptist Church in Layton, Staggs compared himself to Sen. Mike Lee multiple times.

“The decision is are we going to replace Mitt Romney with Mitt Romney 2.0? Or are we going to put in another Mike Lee?” Staggs said.

Read more of what Staggs and Tuberville said about Utah's senate race.

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