US President Donald Trump announced on Friday that he was once again delaying enforcement of the TikTok sale-or-ban law for 75 days.
The deadline had been due to elapse on Saturday. Trump’s decision means users in the United States will continue to have access to the popular Chinese video app for the time being.
“My Administration has been working very hard on a Deal to SAVE TIKTOK, and we have made tremendous progress. The Deal requires more work to ensure all necessary approvals are signed,” Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform.
Former president Joe Biden signed the law into effect a year ago after it was overwhelmingly approved in Congress on national security grounds.
Lawmakers from both parties said they feared that the Chinese government could gain access to vast amounts of personal data and use the platform to exert political influence.
The law first gave TikTok’s China-based owner ByteDance until January 19 to divest from its US operations or face a nationwide blackout from Google and Apple’s app stores.
But Trump, upon his return the White House on January 20 for a second term, issued an executive order that extended the deadline by 75 days to April 5.
Trump tried to ban TikTok during his first presidency by issuing an executive order in 2020, saying TikTok’s “risks are real.”
That attempt was thwarted by a US federal judge, who said the then president did not have the authority to ban the app.
But Trump has had a change of heart.
He now credits TikTok with helping him connect with young voters during his election campaign. “I have a warm spot in my heart for TikTok,” Trump said at a press conference in December.
Trump and Vice President JD Vance raised expectations in recent days that a solution for TikTok could be found before Saturday’s deadline.
According to media reports, Trump’s proposal involves spinning off a US entity called TikTok America. The software company Oracle and the financial firms Blackstone and Andreessen Horowitz are reportedly in the running to lead the offshoot.
The new investors would own around 50% of the app, while existing international investors would maintain around 30%, diluting ByteDance’s ownership to just under 20%, as required by the law, the reports said.
The existing TikTok algorithm would continue to be used to decide which videos users see, and would be licensed to TikTok America, the reports said.
However, the algorithm could become a stumbling block, as critics warn that it could be used by the Chinese government to influence public opinion in the US. The law also states that neither the Chinese government nor Bytedance can have any control over the algorithm.
Trump said recently that there are “various ways to buy TikTok.”
But ByteDance and TikTok have long maintained that it is impossible to sell only the US part of the app as this would fragment the platform.
It is still unclear what China and Bytedance think of the propsoed deal.