You'd have to be incredibly naive to think China wouldn't use TikTok to influence American discourse.
What is the actual problem with this tho? The US has used Hollywood to influence worldwide discourse for generations.
But aren't they? If I'm not mistaken, in China TikTok tends to shows educational content to kids. Meanwhile, in the west we get girls in bikinis dancing to the latest horrible pop song, and/or political narratives that align with whatever the chinese governments wants or at least does not disapprove of. It's a fact, even down here in Brazil which is definitely not a world power you can see how the algo is biased.
It's an algorithm that shows people stuff they engage with.
While Chinese tiktok users are interested in educational content, Americans are not.
It's a well know fact that the reason chinese TikTok is an educational app is because the chinese government told them to do it. Just like they stopped chinese gamers from gaming for more than X hours in the day. You either don't know what you are talking about or you are willfully ignoring the facts. If the average chinese teenage boy was left to the hands of an "unbiased" TikTok algo, I bet the farm he would be seeing K-Pop idols and chinese fit influencers all day. Same for the girls, teenagers everywhere (in the sense of the average teenager) can't resist the crack cocaine temptations of an unlimited algo.