Just over a year ago, lawmakers displayed a rare show of bipartisanship when they grilled Shou Chew, TikTok’s chief executive, about the video app’s ties to China. Their harsh questioning suggested that Washington was gearing up to force the company to sever ties with its Chinese owner — or even ban the app.

就在一年多前，议员们就TikTok与中国的关系质问了该视频应用的首席执行官周受资，罕见地展现了两党合作。他们的严厉质询表明华盛顿当时正准备迫使该公司与其中国母公司切断关系，甚至做好了禁止该应用程序的准备。

Then came mostly silence. Little emerged from the House committee that held the hearing, and a proposal to enable the administration to force a sale or ban TikTok fizzled in the Senate.

接下来的大部分时间里一切悄无声息。举行听证会的众议院委员会几乎没有透露任何信息，一项让政府强制出售或禁止TikTok的提案在参议院也以失败告终。

But behind the scenes, a tiny group of lawmakers began plotting a secretive effort that culminated on Wednesday, when President Biden signed a bill that forces TikTok to be sold by its Chinese owner, ByteDance, or risk being banned. The measure, which the Senate passed late Tuesday, upends the future of an app that claims 170 million users in the United States and that touches virtually every aspect of American life.

但在幕后，一小群议员开始策划一项在周三达到了高潮的秘密行动，就在那天，拜登总统签署了一项法案，迫使TikTok中国母公司字节跳动将其出售，否则该应用就有被禁止的风险。参议院周二晚间通过的这项措施颠覆了一款在美国拥有1.7亿用户、几乎涉及美国人生活方方面面的应用程序的未来。

For nearly a year, lawmakers and some of their aides worked to write a version of the bill, concealing their efforts to avoid setting off TikTok’s lobbying might. To bulletproof the bill from expected legal challenges and persuade uncertain lawmakers, the group worked with the Justice Department and White House.

近一年来，议员和他们的一些助手一直在努力起草该法案的一个版本，为了避免引来TikTok的强大游说力量，他们隐藏了自己在这方面所做的努力。为了使该法案免受预期的法律挑战并说服尚未下定决心的议员，这个团体与司法部和白宫进行了合作。

And the last stage — a race to the president’s desk that led some aides to nickname the bill the “Thunder Run” — played out in seven weeks from when it was publicly introduced, remarkably fast for Washington.

最后一个阶段——也就是将法案尽快送到总统办公桌的过程，令一些助手将该法案戏称为“迅雷突击”——从法案公开提出后的七周内就完成了，以华盛顿的标准是相当迅速的。

“You don’t get many opportunities like this on a major issue,” said Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the Republican majority leader. He was one of 15 lawmakers, aides and officials directly involved in shaping and passing the bill who were interviewed for this article.

“在重大问题上你不会得到很多这样的机会，”共和党多数党领袖、路易斯安那州众议员史蒂夫·斯卡利斯说。他是直接参与制定和通过该法案的15名议员、助手和官员之一，他们接受了本文的采访。

共和党多数党领袖、众议员史蒂夫·斯卡利斯推动两党共同努力解决对TikTok的安全担忧。

“This fight’s been going on for years,” Mr. Scalise said. “We learned a lot from each step, and we wanted to make sure we had strong legal standing and a strong bipartisan coalition to do this.”

“这场斗争已经持续了多年，”斯卡利斯说。“我们从每一步中都学到了很多东西，我们希望确保我们有坚实的法律基础和强大的两党联盟来做到这一点。”

Their success contrasts with the stumbles by other lawmakers and American officials, starting during the Trump administration, to address national security concerns about TikTok. They say the Chinese government could lean on ByteDance to obtain sensitive U.S. user data or influence content on the app to serve Beijing’s interests, including interfering in American elections.

从特朗普政府时期开始，其他议员和美国官员在解决有关TikTok的国家安全担忧方面屡屡遇挫，与现在的成功形成了鲜明对比。他们表示，中国政府可能依靠字节跳动获取敏感的美国用户数据或影响该应用程序上的内容，以服务于北京的利益，其中包括干预美国选举。

TikTok has pushed back against those accusations, saying that the Chinese government plays no role in the company and that it has taken steps and spent billions of dollars to address the concerns. It has also fought back aggressively in the courts against previous actions by federal and state governments.

TikTok反驳了这些指控，称中国政府在该公司中没有扮演任何角色，且已采取措施并花费数十亿美元来解决这些问题。TikTok还在法庭上对联邦政府和州政府之前的行动进行了积极反击。

But the strategy employed by the lawmakers in recent weeks caught TikTok flat-footed. And while the app is unlikely to disappear from Americans’ phones as next steps are worked out, the measure stands out as the first time a U.S. president has signed a bill that could result in a wide ban of a foreign app.

但议员们最近几周采取的策略让TikTok措手不及。虽然在下一步措施制定的过程中，该应用程序不太可能从美国人的手机上消失，但这项措施引人注目，因为这是美国总统首次签署一项可能导致广泛禁止外国应用程序的法案。

In a statement, Alex Haurek, a TikTok spokesman, said the bill “was crafted in secret, rushed through the House and ultimately passed as part of a larger, must-pass bill exactly because it is a ban that Americans will find objectionable.”

TikTok发言人亚历克斯·豪雷克在一份声明中表示，该法案“是秘密制定的，匆忙在众议院获得通过，并最终作为一项更大的、必须通过的法案的一部分获得通过，正是因为这是一项美国人会反对的禁令”。

He added that it was “sadly ironic that Congress would pass a law trampling 170 million Americans’ right to free expression as part of a package they say is aimed at advancing freedom around the world.”

他补充说，“具有讽刺意味的是，国会通过一项践踏1.7亿美国人言论自由权的法律，而这是他们说的旨在促进世界各地自由的行动的一部分。”

From Tiny Huddle to Big Majority

 从一小群人到大多数人

众议员麦克·加拉格尔在众议院投票通过TikTok法案当天向记者发表讲话。

The effort around a TikTok bill began with Mr. Scalise, who met with Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a Republican from Washington, in March last year about their desire to see a measure that took on the app.

围绕TikTok法案的努力始于斯卡利斯，去年3月，他与华盛顿州共和党众议员凯茜·麦克莫里斯·罗杰斯会面，就应该对该应用采取何种措施进行了讨论。

They began talking with other Republican lawmakers and aides across several committees about a new bill. By August, they had decided to shepherd a potential bill through a House committee focused on China, the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, led by Representatives Mike Gallagher, a Wisconsin Republican and its chairman, and Raja Krishnamoorthi, an Illinois Democrat.

他们开始与其他共和党议员和几个委员会的助手讨论一项新法案。到了8月，他们决定藉由一个专注于中国的众议院委员会推动一项潜在法案的通过。该委员会便是中国共产党问题特设委员会，由担任主席的威斯康星州共和党众议员迈克·加拉格尔和伊利诺伊州民主党人拉贾·克里希纳莫尔蒂领导。

The bipartisan committee swiftly embraced the effort. “What we recognized was that there were so many different approaches and the technical issues were so complex,” Mr. Krishnamoorthi said.

这个两党委员会迅速采纳了他们的想法。克里希纳莫尔蒂说：“我们认识到，有许多不同的方法，技术性的问题也非常复杂。”

So the committee hatched a strategy: Win the support of Democrats, the White House and the Justice Department for a new bill.

因此，委员会制定了一项战略：赢得民主党、白宫和司法部对新法案的支持。

Its efforts got a lift after lawmakers including Mr. Gallagher accused TikTok of intentionally pushing pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel content to its users last year. Mr. Krishnamoorthi and others said the Israel-Gaza conflict stoked lawmakers’ appetites to regulate the app.

去年，包括加拉格尔在内的议员指责TikTok故意向用户推送支持巴勒斯坦和反以色列的内容，这对他们的立法行动起到了助推作用。克里希纳莫尔蒂等人表示，以色列与加沙的冲突激起了议员监管该应用的欲望。

In November, the group, which then numbered fewer than 20 key people, brought in officials from the Justice Department, including Lisa Monaco, the deputy attorney general, and staff from the National Security Council to help secure the Biden administration’s support for a new bill.

11月，当时只有不到20名关键人物的委员会请来了司法部官员（包括副部长丽莎·摩纳可）和国家安全委员会的工作人员，以帮助争取拜登政府对新法案的支持。

For years, the administration had weighed a proposal by TikTok, called Project Texas, that aimed to keep sensitive U.S. user data separate from the rest of the company’s operations. The Justice Department and National Security Council officials agreed to support the new bill partly because they saw Project Texas as inadequate to handle national security concerns involving TikTok, two administration officials said.

多年来，美国政府一直在权衡TikTok提出的一项名为“得克萨斯计划”的提案，该提案旨在将美国用户的敏感数据与该公司的其他业务分开。两位政府官员称，司法部和国家安全委员会官员同意支持新法案，部分原因是他们认为得克萨斯计划不足以处理涉及TikTok的国家安全问题。

In conversations with lawmakers, White House officials emphasized that they wanted ByteDance to sell TikTok rather than impose a ban, partly because of the app’s popularity with Americans, three people involved in the process said.

在议员们的对话中，白宫官员强调，他们希望字节跳动出售TikTok，而不是对其实施禁令，部分原因是该应用在美国人中很受欢迎。

The Justice Department and Ms. Monaco provided guidance on how to write the bill so it could withstand legal challenges. TikTok previously fended off efforts to ban it by citing the First Amendment rights of its users. The officials explained how to word the bill to defend against those claims, citing national security.

司法部和摩纳可就如何撰写法案使其能够经受住法律挑战提供了指导。TikTok此前曾以用户的第一修正案权利为由，抵制了禁止TikTok的努力。为了反驳这种论点，官员们解释了如何以国家安全为由来撰写法案。

With the administration’s support in hand, the group quietly solicited more supporters in the House. The Justice Department joined members of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and F.B.I. to brief House committees on the threats posed by TikTok’s Chinese ownership. The briefings were later delivered in the Senate.

有了政府的支持，该委员会悄悄地在众议院寻求了更多支持者。司法部与国家情报总监办公室和联邦调查局的成员一起，向众议院各委员会通报了TikTok的中国所有权所带来的威胁。这些简报随后在参议院进行了宣读。

Ms. Monaco also met individually with lawmakers, warning them that TikTok could be used to disrupt U.S. elections.

摩纳可还分别会见了议员们，警告他们TikTok可能会被用来破坏美国选举。

“She built out a powerful case, and we agreed that not only was data gathering taking place, she shared that you have 170 million American that were vulnerable to propaganda,” Senator Mark Warner, Democrat of Virginia, said of a meeting with Ms. Monaco in Munich in February.

弗吉尼亚州民主党参议员马克·华纳在谈到今年2月在慕尼黑与摩纳可的会面时说：“她的论证很扎实，我们一致认为他们不只是在收集数据，她还告诉我们，1.7亿美国人很容易受到宣传的影响。”

On March 5, Mr. Gallagher and Mr. Krishnamoorthi announced the bill and named around 50 House members who endorsed it. The Energy and Commerce Committee, which is led by Ms. McMorris Rodgers, took the bill up that week.

3月5日，加拉格尔和克里希纳莫尔蒂宣布了该法案，并列出了约50名支持该法案的众议员。麦克莫里斯·罗杰斯领导的能源与商业委员会在当周审议了该法案。

TikTok, which had been negotiating with U.S. officials over its Project Texas plan, was caught off guard. It quickly sent information to members of the Energy and Commerce Committee outlining TikTok’s economic contributions in their districts, according to documents viewed by The New York Times. It also used a pop-up message on its app to urge users to call legislators to oppose a ban.

这让一直在就得克萨斯计划与美国官员进行谈判的TikTok猝不及防。根据《纽约时报》查看的文件，它迅速向能源和商务委员会成员发送信息，概述了TikTok在其选区的经济贡献。该公司还在其应用程序上弹出消息，敦促用户致电议员反对禁令。

Two days after the bill was unveiled, Ms. McMorris Rodgers’s committee voted 50 to 0 to advance it to the full House, where it passed the next week by 352 to 65.

在该法案公布两天后，麦克莫里斯·罗杰斯所在的委员会以50票对0票将其提交给众议院全体会议，并在下一周以352票对65票获得了通过。

There were tears of joy in Mr. Krishnamoorthi’s office, two people said. Mr. Gallagher’s staff members celebrated with a cookie cake sent by Mr. Scalise, one of his signature rewards for successful legislation.

据两人称，有人在克里希纳莫尔蒂的办公室流下了喜悦的泪水。加拉格尔的工作人员用斯卡利斯送来的饼干蛋糕庆祝，这是他对成功立法的标志性奖励之一。

A Less Certain Future

不那么确定的未来

Even with the bill’s swift passage in the House, its future in the Senate was uncertain. Some senators, including powerful committee chairs like Maria Cantwell, a Democrat of Washington, and Mr. Warner, considered changes to the bill in a process that could significantly slow it down.

即使该法案在众议院迅速获得通过，其在参议院的前景当时仍不明朗。一些参议员，包括手握重权的委员会主席、华盛顿州民主党人玛丽亚·坎特韦尔和华纳，都考虑对法案进行修改，这可能会大大延缓法案的进程。

The House bill gave ByteDance six months to sell TikTok. Senators wanted to extend the timeline and detail the government’s national security concerns about TikTok in the bill, to make it clear to courts how it justified the measure.

众议院法案规定字节跳动在六个月内出售TikTok。参议员们希望延长这一期限，并在法案中详细说明政府对TikTok的国家安全担忧，以便法院清楚地了解政府采取这一措施的理由。

加拉格尔的工作人员拿着斯卡利斯办公室送来的饼干蛋糕，庆祝TikTok法案上个月在众议院获得通过。

As the bill sat in the Senate, a new opportunity presented itself. The House speaker, Mike Johnson, announced an attempt last week to pass foreign aid for countries including Ukraine. To ensure he had the votes, Mr. Johnson took the unusual step of attaching a package of bills popular with Republicans, including the TikTok measure.

就在该法案在参议院搁置之时，一个新的机会出现了。众议院议长迈克·约翰逊上周宣布试图通过对包括乌克兰在内的国家的对外援助。为了确保获得票数，约翰逊采取了一个不同寻常的做法，即附加上一揽子受共和党人欢迎的法案，其中包括TikTok法案。

Senators scrambled now that the House had forced their hand. Ms. Cantwell’s office asked the House for multiple edits to the measure, a person with knowledge of the matter said.

在众议院的施压下，参议员们手忙脚乱。一位知情人士说，坎特韦尔的办公室曾要求众议院对该措施进行多项修改。

House lawmakers made just one change the Senate wanted. The version of the bill in the aid package extended the deadline for a TikTok sale to nine months from six months. The president can add another 90 days if ByteDance has made progress toward selling TikTok.

众议院议员们只做出了一项参议院希望看到的修改。合并在一揽子援助方案中的该法案将出售TikTok的期限从六个月延长至九个月。如果字节跳动在出售方面取得进展，总统可以再延长90天。

“The most important thing is to have enough time to effect a sale,” Ms. Cantwell said.

坎特韦尔说：“最重要的是要有足够的时间实现出售。”

The change was enough. Late Tuesday, the Senate passed the bill overwhelmingly, 79 to 18. On Wednesday morning, Mr. Biden signed it into law.

这个改变已经足矣。周二晚些时候，参议院以79票对18票的压倒性多数通过了该法案。周三上午，拜登总统签署了该法案，使之成为法律。