President Trump threw TikTok a lifeline Monday night, giving the popular app’s parent company 75 more days to find a buyer for the platform.
The 78-year-old argued during a conversation with reporters in the Oval Office that the US should “get half” of TikTok, before caveating that some percentage of that could be from the private sector.
Beijing-based ByteDance had a Jan. 19 deadline to sell off the platform due to national security concerns or have it be pulled from US-based app stores like Apple and Google Play.
ByteDance refused to sell, saying it would rather shut TikTok down completely.
Congress passed the “divest-or-ban” legislation in April of last year in April of last year and it was signed into law by President Biden, responding to concerns from national security experts about the platform giving the Chinese Communist Party access to a vast trove of American user data.
Those experts have also raised concerns about TikTok being weaponized as a propaganda tool against the US.
The Supreme Court upheld the forced divestiture law Jan. 17.
During his first administration, Trump had taken executive action to ban Tiktok that was shot down by the courts.
Since then, the president had a change of heart, crediting TikTok for helping him make inroads with younger voters during the 2024 campaign. Trump had also been pressed on the issue by GOP megadonor Jeff Yass, who owns 7% of ByteDance.
TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew got a prized seat in the Capitol Rotunda for Trump’s swearing-in, a privilege that governors and other key officials were not afforded.
Trump’s stance on TikTok has put him at odds with China hawks in the GOP, such as Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), who backed the ban, though they have been careful not to castigate the president publicly.
TikTok briefly went offline Saturday night into Sunday — ostensibly due to the ban, even though the sale deadline had not been reached. It later came back online after Trump unveiled his plans to intervene, with critics accusing the app of engaging in a publicity stunt.
The platform estimates that it has a user base of about 170 million in the US, but as Trump told reporters Monday night: “TikTok is worthless if I don’t approve it.”
This story originally appeared on NYPost
