PALO ALTO, California -- The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill Wednesday that would ban TikTok in the country unless its ties with Chinese parent company ByteDance are cut within six months.

Unlike the House committee vote last week that passed the bill unanimously, it faced some opposition from both Democratic and Republican lawmakers on Wednesday. The bill passed by a vote of 352 to 65, with one member voting present. 

But the fate of TikTok, which 170 million Americans use to share and flip through short clips, is far from certain as the bill heads to the Senate. The legislation faces an unlikely but powerful opponent: former President Donald Trump, who once tried to ban the video app himself.

The bipartisan bill, titled Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, calls to ban TikTok and any "successor applications" developed by ByteDance unless the Chinese tech group divests its shares. 

If the Senate passes the bill after review, it then goes to President Joe Biden's desk to be signed into law. Biden has vowed to sign the bill if it passes.

TikTok critics have long argued that its Chinese-controlled parent, ByteDance, would share data on U.S. users with the Chinese government or pressure TikTok to promote Beijing's views. TikTok has said it wouldn't comply with such demands if they were made.

"This process was secret and the bill was jammed through for one reason: it's a ban. We are hopeful that the Senate will consider the facts, listen to their constituents, and realize the impact on the economy, 7 million small businesses, and the 170 million Americans who use our service," TikTok said in a statement Wednesday after the bill's passage.

The bill is not the only attempt by the U.S. to force a divestiture of TikTok or ban the app.

Last year, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), an agency led by the Treasury Department that evaluates cross-border deals, told ByteDance to unload its stake in TikTok. Failure to do so would leave TikTok facing a possible ban in the country, Nikkei Asia previously reported. But no action has been taken since.

In 2020, then-President Trump issued two executive orders. One banned TikTok in the U.S. but was blocked by a federal judge that year, and later revoked by Biden in 2021. The other required ByteDance to divest its U.S. assets and delete all American user data. This order led to the CFIUS order to divest.

Now Trump -- who on Tuesday clinched the Republican nomination for president in the 2024 election -- has reversed his stance despite calling TikTok a national security risk for years.

In an interview with CNBC on Monday, Trump said a ban on the Chinese-backed software would benefit Facebook, which he considers "an enemy of the people." The former president has blamed Facebook and other media for his loss to Biden in 2020.

In addition to Trump's animosity toward Meta, Facebook's parent, TikTok's appeal with young voters and the app's billionaire tech backers may be contributing to the former president's opposition to the bill.

"Frankly, there are a lot of people on TikTok that love it. There are a lot of young kids on TikTok who will go crazy without it. There are a lot of users. There's a lot of good and there's a lot of bad with TikTok," Trump said in the CNBC interview.

Trump appears to have had his change of heart after a reported meeting with billionaire donor Jeff Yass at an annual retreat of the conservative political organization Club for Growth in early March. Yass, a major donor to the Republican party and Club for Growth, owns about 15% of TikTok's parent ByteDance through his trading firm Susquehanna International Group, according to media reports.

If ByteDance is forced to divest TikTok, the valuation of the private Chinese tech group would be significantly impacted, dealing a blow to early investors like Yass.

Kellyanne Conway, a former senior Trump aide, is being paid by Club for Growth to advocate for TikTok in Congress, the U.S. news site Politico reported.

But Trump and his allies are not the only ones on Capitol Hill who are against the bill. More than five lawmakers, from both parties, stood on the House floor Wednesday morning to voice their opposition ahead of the vote over concerns about government overreach, freedom of speech and disruption of a free market. 

Republicans voted 197 yeas and 15 nays on the bill while Democrats split their votes 155 to 50. 

"The answer to authoritarianism is not more authoritarianism. The answer to CCP-style propaganda is not CCP-style oppression," said Tom McClintock, a Democratic congressman from California.

"Some of us are concerned about their First Amendment implications here," said Thomas Massie, a Republican congressman from Kentucky. "Americans have the right to view information. We don't need to be protected by the government from information. Some of us just don't want the president picking which apps we can put on our phones or which websites we can visit. We don't think that's appropriate. We also think it's dangerous to give the president that kind of power."

TikTok users have also flooded Congress with calls after the app sent out notifications to urge them to voice their concerns about the potential ban.

However, these tactics could backfire, as some lawmakers called TikTok's message to users an attempt to "manipulate the American people."

"It's disappointing members of Congress would complain about hearing from their own constituents," TikTok responded in a statement, adding that "Americans have a Constitutional right to petition their government."

Other civil rights groups have also opposed the bill over concerns about violating freedom of speech.

"As the flood of constituent calls to Congress confirms, TikTok is a vital platform for accessing information and expressing ourselves," said Jenna Leventoff, senior policy counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union. "When this bill comes to the floor for a vote, we urge representatives to stand up for free speech, and vote down this misguided bill."

Meanwhile, Beijing has repeatedly said it "strongly opposes" a forced sale of TikTok, and that a sale or divestiture would involve exporting technology and must follow Chinese laws. It is yet to be seen whether Chinese authorities would block a divestiture.

Ahead of the Wednesday House vote, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said at a regular press conference that the "bullying behavior" by the U.S. will disrupt the normal international economic and trade order.

"In the end, this will inevitably come back to bite the United States itself," said Wang. 

Some are concerned about potential retaliation from Beijing that would affect American tech companies reliant on the massive China market. 

"While there are many questions around its ultimate path in the Senate and if this bill ever sees an actual vote, today's action in our view represents a very slippery slope around social media restrictions, First Amendment rights and potential retaliatory actions China can head towards the likes of Apple and Tesla and U.S. Big Tech," said Dan Ives, managing director at Wedbush Securities.