Sen. Mark Warner's Tells TikTokers Fearing Ban, National Security Comes First

TikTok users worried the U.S. government is gearing up to ban the platform might have good reason to feel that way ... according to the U.S. Senator spearheading those efforts.

We got Sen. Mark Warner Thursday as he was leaving FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C., and asked what if any advice he had for the millions of influencers making a good living on the app. His answer is, Charli D'Amelio and co. need to be as concerned as politicians are about who's collecting their information.

ICYMI ... Warner and Sen. John Thune introduced a bipartisan bill this week that would give President Biden wide-ranging power to restrict TikTok use, or flat-out ban it, if there's reason to believe China is gathering U.S. citizens' data from TikTok's Chinese parent company, ByteDance.

The White House has already said it supports the legislation -- which applies to all foreign technologies, not just TikTok -- but Congress has yet to put it to a vote.

Sen. Warner acknowledges there's "a lot of great things happening on TikTok," but says Congress can't be concerned with that ... not if national security hangs in the balance.

IF there's a ban -- as was threatened years ago under the Trump administration -- Warner says TikTok users shouldn't be too concerned, because he's certain a new app would quickly spring up to host the hot new dance challenge.