WASHINGTON, April 22 (Reuters) - Republican presidential

candidate Donald Trump said on Monday that President Joe Biden

was "pushing" for a ban on TikTok and would be the one

responsible if a ban were imposed, urging voters to take notice.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed bipartisan

legislation on a 360-58 vote on Saturday that would give

TikTok's Chinese owner ByteDance about nine months to divest its

U.S. operations or face a ban.

The bill now moves to the Senate. If it passes there,

Biden has said he would sign it into law.

Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform on

Monday that Biden would be "responsible for banning TikTok. He

is the one pushing it to close, and doing it to help his friends

over at Facebook become richer and more dominant."

Trump then urged younger voters - who make up a significant

portion of the TikTok user base - to consider Biden's position

on Election Day.

However, when he was president in 2020, Trump himself sought

to ban TikTok and Chinese-owned WeChat over national security

concerns but was blocked by the courts.

TikTok, which says it has not and would not share U.S. user

data with the Chinese government, has argued that a ban would

trample on free speech rights under the First Amendment of the

U.S. Constitution for the 170 million users of its app in the

country.

The company told employees over the weekend in an email seen

by Reuters that as soon as Biden signs the legislation "we will

move to the courts for a legal challenge. We'll continue to

fight, as this legislation is a clear violation of the First

Amendment."

A White House spokesperson said on Monday: "We do not want

to ban apps like TikTok. What we want - and what the legislation

we support would do - is ensure that TikTok becomes owned by an

American company so that our and our children's sensitive

personal data stays here instead of going to China and so that

Americans' understandings and views can't be manipulated by

algorithms potentially controlled by the PRC."

Recently, Trump has argued that curbing TikTok would

strengthen Meta Platforms' ( META ) Facebook, a platform he has

criticized since his access was revoked after the Jan. 6, 2021,

U.S. Capitol riot. His account was reinstated last year.

Under the legislation, app stores operated by Apple ( AAPL )

, Alphabet's Google and others could not

legally offer TikTok or provide web hosting services to

ByteDance-controlled applications once the divestment deadline

had passed.

In February, Biden's reelection campaign joined TikTok.

Trump's campaign has not.