President Donald Trump has said a deal with TikTok’s Chinese parent ByteDance to sell the short video app would be struck before the April 5 deadline, news agency Reuters reported on Sunday.
Trump had set the April 5 deadline in January for TikTok to find a non-Chinese buyer or face a US ban on national security grounds set to have taken effect that month under a 2024 law.
“We have a lot of potential buyers,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One late on Sunday. “There’s tremendous interest in Tiktok,” adding, “I’d like to see Tiktok remain alive,” he said, as reported by Reuters.
170 million Americans use TikTok. President Donald Trump had previously signalled that he might extend the deadline further if a sale cannot be completed in time.
TikTok was briefly taken offline in the United States due to a bipartisan law called the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act. But soon after assuming office, Trump gave the app a 75-day reprieve to comply with the law by signing an executive order.
Will TikTok be banned after April 5?
According to existing federal law, TikTok will be banned unless ByteDance divests its American business before the April 5 deadline. Trump said earlier that he would give another extension if the sale is not completed, as mentioned in a report by USA Today.
The law enabling the TikTok ban allows President Trump to make a 90-day extension of the divestment.
President Trump can still grant another extension until April 5, if he wishes. The Trump administration has yet to indicate whether it has plans of another executive order.
I’d like to see TikTok remain alive.
Last week, President Trump told reporters that he would consider lowering tariffs on China to encourage Beijing, where ByteDance is based, to support a sale of TikTok’s US assets. However, the president ultimately said he will just extend the ban again if a deal isn’t finalized by the deadline, USA Today reported.
TikTok ban on January 19
TikTok was briefly banned on January 19 over concerns about its link with China. Trump gave TikTok 75 days to find a new buyer based in the US. However, whether ByteDance is open to selling the popular video app remains unclear.
“I guess I have a warm spot for TikTok that I didn’t have originally, but I went on TikTok and I won young people,” Trump said while signing the executive order.
(With inputs from Reuters)
