Oracle met with Senate aides about TikTok data storage after House ban passed

• Oracle privately met with Senate aides about their data housing agreement with TikTok after a bill that could ban the social media app from use in the United States passed the House in mid-March.
• If the social media app is banned, Oracle could face financial headwinds, according to analysts.
• Oracle met with a mix of staffers from the Senate Commerce Committee and Senate Intelligence Committee to discuss efforts to house U.S. TikTok's users data on Oracle cloud servers

Oracle's top lobbyist in Washington met privately with Senate aides about the company's data housing agreement with TikTok this spring, after a bill that could effectively ban the social media app in the United States passed the House in mid-March.

Oracle acts as the data center for U.S. TikTok users. The House legislation would require TikTok's China-based parent company ByteDance to divest the social media app, or face an eventual ban in the United States.

"We had four meetings, primarily to discuss the technical mitigations" of the data storage project, said Oracle EVP Ken Glueck, who described the previously unreported talks to CNBC on Monday.

To set up the meetings, Oracle turned to two lobbying firms: Fierce Government Relations and Polaris Government Relations, according to Glueck and newly filed disclosure reports.

Glueck led discussions with staffers for the Senate Commerce Committee and the Intelligence Committee, he said. Two of the meetings were in person, and two were over Zoom, he added.

Glueck said Oracle did not lobby for or against the TikTok bill, and only disclosed the meetings on mandatory filings in order to be transparent.

If TikTok is banned, Oracle could face financial headwinds, according to market analysts.

"In a TikTok ban or