President Donald Trump is looking nationwide safety and privateness issues associated to TikTok and its Chinese language dad or mum firm “extremely overrated” and stated Friday he’ll preserve extending the deadline for the favored video-sharing platform till there’s a purchaser.
Congress authorised a U.S. ban on TikTok until its dad or mum firm, ByteDance, bought its controlling stake. However Trump has thus far prolonged the deadline thrice throughout his second time period — with the subsequent one developing on Sept. 17.
“We’re gonna watch the safety issues,” Trump informed reporters, however added, “Now we have consumers, American-buyers,” and “till the complexity of issues work out, we simply prolong slightly bit longer.”
The primary extension was by means of an govt order on Jan. 20, his first day in workplace, after the platform went darkish briefly when a nationwide ban — authorised by Congress and upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court docket — took impact. The second was in April, when White Home officers believed they had been nearing a deal to spin off TikTok into a brand new firm with U.S. possession that fell aside after China backed out following Trump’s tariff announcement.
His feedback observe the White Home beginning a TikTok account this week.
“I used TikTok within the marketing campaign,” Trump stated.
“I’m a fan of TikTok,” he stated. “My children like TikTok. Younger individuals love TikTok. If we might preserve it going.”
Because the extensions proceed, it seems much less and fewer probably that TikTok can be banned within the U.S. any time quickly. The choice to maintain TikTok alive by means of an govt order has obtained some scrutiny, however the administration has not confronted a authorized problem in court docket — not like a lot of Trump’s different govt orders.
Individuals are much more intently divided on what to do about TikTok than they had been two years in the past.
A current Pew Analysis Heart survey discovered that about one-third of Individuals stated they supported a TikTok ban, down from 50% in March 2023. Roughly one-third stated they’d oppose a ban, and the same share stated they weren’t positive.
Amongst those that stated they supported banning the social media platform, about 8 in 10 cited issues over customers’ knowledge safety being in danger as a significant factor of their resolution, in line with the report.
—Related Press
