Celebs Accuse TikTok of Limiting ICE Criticism, TikTok Finally Responds

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Okay, so Meg Stalter, you probably know her from Hacks, just completely wiped her TikTok account. Apparently, she felt the platform was actively suppressing her videos that were critical of ICE – U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. She wasn’t able to post anything about them anymore and strongly believes it’s connected to the recent shift in ownership of the app. It’s a pretty bold move, and raises some serious questions about censorship and who’s really calling the shots over there.

Stalter announced on Instagram that she was leaving TikTok because she no longer felt it was a safe platform for open expression. She explained that the app, now under different ownership, was heavily censoring and monitoring its users.

She explained that any TikTok posts she made mentioning ICE wouldn’t upload. This happened even when she tried to disguise the message within a funny video. At the time, she had over 278,000 followers on the platform.

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TikTok denied accusations of censorship, stating the issue wasn’t related to political views. They explained that a power failure at a U.S. data center caused problems with posting on TikTok and its other apps.

TikTok USDS Joint Venture announced on its new X account that services were down yesterday due to a power outage at a U.S. data center, affecting TikTok and other apps they run. The company is working to resolve the problem and apologized for the inconvenience. Despite the outage, searches for “ICE” still show important content on the app.

We’re working to get TikTok and other apps back up and running after a power outage at a data center in the U.S. affected our services yesterday. We’re collaborating with the data center to fix the problem and apologize for any inconvenience this is causing. We expect to have everything resolved shortly.

— TikTok USDS Joint Venture (@tiktokusdsjv) January 26, 2026

This recent debate follows changes to who owns TikTok in the United States. Last week, ByteDance completed an agreement to establish TikTok U.S., a new company created to comply with a U.S. law that could ban apps with significant foreign ownership. That law prohibits apps controlled by countries considered adversaries. TikTok U.S. is now primarily owned by American investors, including companies like Silver Lake, Oracle, and MGX, an investment firm based in Abu Dhabi.

Recent deadly incidents involving ICE have sparked widespread criticism. Federal agents shot and killed Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old nurse, while responding to protests related to the death of Renee Good. Both Pretti and Good were American citizens. Homeland Security claims the shootings were in self-defense, but these events have intensified public outrage both online and at demonstrations.

This incident brings up important concerns about how much we can trust major online platforms, their commitment to open communication, and how clearly they share information. Even if the stated reason for the disruption is accurate, the timing of it has made many people uncomfortable.

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2026-01-27 00:15