Trump to extend TikTok ban enforcement deadline again
President Donald Trump on Friday announced that he will again postpone the enforcement of the TikTok sale-or-ban law for 75 days. The delay comes after Trump’s tariff announcement derailed a deal that had been set to transfer control of the app’s US operations to American ownership, a familiar source with the deal told CNN.
“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,” President Donald Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
Trump on Friday signed an executive order formalizing the delay in enforcement. The announcement comes just one day before the ban was set to go into effect, after Trump delayed by an initial 75 days it when he took office in January.
TikTok Ban Update
Former President Joe Biden signed a law last year that required TikTok’s China-based parent company ByteDance to divest the app or face a US ban, over national security concerns. The law was set to go into effect in January, but Trump said he would delay its enforcement in hopes of reaching a deal to keep the app “alive.”
For the deal to comply with the law, ByteDance can own no more than 20% of the platform. It also states that the app’s US operations cannot coordinate with ByteDance on the app’s algorithm or data sharing practices.
According to the source familiar with the deal, new and existing US TikTok investors, ByteDance and the Trump administration had all agreed to the deal, but that changed after Trump announced his additional 34% tariff on China.
Representatives for ByteDance informed the White House on Thursday morning that China was pulling out of the deal until negotiations were held regarding the tariffs.
Trump and the White House team overseeing the deal ultimately decided on Friday to delay enforcement of the ban by another 75 days as it was unclear where the talks would go from here.
TikTok ban going dark
Trump did not offer any details on the progress of the potential deal in his Friday post, but indicated more time is needed to finalize it.
Trump’s promise to further delay enforcing the ban will likely mean that TikTok’s 170 million American users can continue to use the popular short-form video app for the foreseeable future.
But the delay in reaching a formal deal raises questions about the app’s long-term future, given the escalating trade war between the United States and China. The Chinese government has offered little public indication that it would be willing to approve a sale.
“We hope to continue working in Good Faith with China, who I understand are not very happy about our Reciprocal Tariffs,” Trump said in his post, “We do not want TikTok to ‘go dark.’”
“We look forward to working with TikTok and China to close the Deal,” he added.
A ByteDance spokesperson said Friday that the TikTok parent company “has been in discussion with the US government regarding a potential solution for TikTok US,” a rare acknowledgement from the company that it is engaged in talks with the White House.
“An agreement has not been executed. There are key matters to be resolved. Any agreement will be subject to approval under Chinese law,” the ByteDance spokesperson said in a statement.It’s unclear how members of Congress who largely agreed on a bipartisan basis last year that the app posed a national security risk, an opinion that the Supreme Court unanimously upheld might respond to a second delay.
The law allowed for a single, 90-day extension of the deadline if the president could certify to Congress that “significant progress” had been made toward a deal.
