An ethics watchdog is asking the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) to investigate Rep. Wiley Nickel (D-NC) for potentially violating federal law and House ethics rules by abusing official resources for political purposes.
The Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT) filed an ethics complaint with the ethics office this week, asking for an investigation into Nickel’s use of the Chinese social media app TikTok to determine if his account violated House rules and abused official resources for political purposes.
The popular Chinese social media app, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance Ltd, was banned on United States government devices when a provision was added to the $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill President Joe Biden signed into law for being a potential national security problem. And lawmakers are looking to ban TikTok entirely in the United States over many significant concerns over the app’s abilities.
FACT noted that despite warnings not to use TikTok over the risk of the Chinese government being able to see data, Nickel has allegedly been using the same TikTok account for both official House and political purposes — which would be a violation of House Ethics rules.
The complaint explained some of the content seen on the congressman’s account, where he is described as the “Congressman for #NC13”:
In spite of this, Rep. Nickel has a TikTok account that he is clearly using for both official House and political purposes. The biography portion of the account describes him as a “Congressman for #NC13” and he directly links to his campaign website:
…
Nickel’s TikTok has campaign and political posts, including video of campaign advertisements, video of Nickel at campaign events, and videos of campaign interviews. Along with this political content, Nickel has also made posts that used official government resources, including video filmed in the Capitol and a C-SPAN interview filmed in the Capitol while he was wearing his Member pin.
FACT explained the Federal laws and House ethics rules that require a strict divide between campaign and official acts, such as members being “prohibited from using official resources for campaign purposes” and members being “prohibited from using campaign funds for official purposes.”
Due to these rules, FACT has explained that the TikTok account abuses government resources because there is official and political content posted, in addition to official video recorded on the House floor, which the watchdog says could be another violation of the ethics rules.
“These violations reveal a complete disregard for the clear and longstanding prohibition of using official resources for political purposes. Complying with the law and House Ethics rules are a fundamental obligation for elected officials,” said FACT Executive Director Kendra Arnold. “ The OCE must move swiftly to investigate and enforce these bright-line standards and apply the requisite penalty.”
Last month, the ethics watchdog also filed a complaint against Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) for the same thing after noticing her TikTok account described her as the“Congresswoman for #MN05” and included “overtly political posts” and “posts that used official government resources.”
Jacob Bliss is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jbliss@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter @JacobMBliss.
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