The broad view among TikTok users is that those representing Congress are out of touch with social media technology, and more reminiscent of exasperated conversations had with your grandparents who can’t get Skype to work.

Users also accused several Congress members of interrupting the CEO, and demanding “yes or no” answers to uninformed or even nonsensical questions. All of which has made for great fodder on TikTok itself.

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Congressman Richard Hudson of North Carolina, who asked whether TikTok has access to home Wi-Fi networks, has become the source of numerous videos capturing the confused looks between Chew and Hudson, as users take aim at the Congressman’s apparent lack of knowledge around basic technology.

“There needs to be an age limit in congress,” one TikToker writes in the caption of a video capturing Earl “Buddy” Carter, who represents Georgia’s first district, asking about the app’s use of a phone’s camera to allegedly collect body and facial data to feed the algorithm.

”Why do you need to know where the eyes are if you’re not seeing if they’re dilated,” Carter asked, garnering bewildered looks from Chew.

Users quickly picked up on the inability of several representatives to pronounce certain words, such as “algorithm” and “TikTok” itself, with some of them stumbling multiple times before ultimately giving up and moving on.

“It says here you’re obsessed with ‘Al Gore’s rhythm’,” one user says in his tongue-in-cheek re-enactment of one such moment during the hearing, an obvious play on a Congress member’s failure to say “algorithm”.

The outpouring of support for Chew verges on levels of affection usually reserved for celebrities, with some TikTokers admiring more than just the Singaporean CEO’s resilience.

“I wanna be Mrs Shou Chew,” one user wrote in the caption of a video depicting Chew during the hearing. Another jokes that Chew’s name rhymes with “TikTok daddy bae” while others show photo montages of Chew overlaid with romantic music and suggestive eggplant and Pedro Pascal emojis.

Some US politicians have taken to the platform to express their opposition to a ban. “Do I believe TikTok should be banned? No,” said Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a Democratic representative of New York, on Friday in her very first TikTok video.

Chew himself, who usually steers clear of posting his own content online, posted a video through TikTok’s main account saying that TikTok remained committed to transparency and the protection of its users. As of Thursday, his video had 5.3 million likes and over 26 million views.

“We will continue to protect your data from unauthorised foreign access,” Chew said. “We will ensure that TikTok remains a platform for free expression and that it cannot be manipulated by any government.”

“We know that trust is built with every decision that we make.”

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