As the deadline approaches for ByteDance to divest from TikTok or face a ban in the United States, the Chinese company made an appeal Monday to U.S. courts to extend the date of the ultimatum until after President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.
The current deadline requires ByteDance to divest from TikTok by Jan. 19, 2025, a day before Trump is sworn into office.
Despite an unsuccessful attempt in his first term to ban the social media platform, Trump promised during his recent presidential campaign to save the video-hosting service –– a promise that ByteDance is willing to bet on as it seeks to extend the "divest or ban" deadline.
In April, Congress addressed the perceived national security concerns posed by TikTok. The decision to ban or divest the platform was unanimously upheld as constitutional by the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals on December 6.
“The First Amendment exists to protect free speech in the United States,” the court, in an opinion written by Judge Douglas Ginsburg, said Friday. “Here the Government acted solely to protect that freedom from a foreign adversary nation and to limit that adversary’s ability to gather data on people in the United States.”
TikTok has over 170 million users in the United States. A September survey conducted by the Pew Research Center showed that 17% of American adults regularly get news from the platform.
Trump, once a staunch opponent of the app, now stands to become its savior, pending the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court to grant ByteDance an extension on the deadline.
During his first term, Trump signed an executive order banning TikTok. In the order, which was ultimately blocked by a federal judge, Trump expressed concerns over data privacy and the threat TikTok could pose to U.S. national security.
Last June, Trump created a TikTok account which has since amassed nearly 15 million followers and 106 million likes. In a video posted on Truth Social in September, he appealed to voters.
“For all of those that want to save TikTok in America, vote for Trump,” he said.
Analysts argue that Trump’s change in tone could be attributed to his personal relationship with the platform and its potential use in negotiations with China.
“Trump became familiar with TikTok during the campaign and saw how it helped him reach a massive following in the U.S.,” said Anupam Chander, a law professor at Georgetown University who focuses on global new technology regulation.
“He also still blames TikTok's main rival, Facebook, for his election loss in 2020 because of what he sees as censorship by Facebook,” Chander told VOA.
Beyond his connection to the app, Trump could benefit from using the uncertain fate of the social media app as leverage against the Chinese government as part of “his transactional approach to politics,” said Emile Dirks, a researcher at the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab.
“Trump has threatened to impose further tariffs on Chinese goods in response to alleged Chinese inaction on fentanyl shipments to the United States. He may treat the looming ban or forced sale of the social networking service as a bargaining chip in negotiations with Beijing,” Dirks told VOA by email.
Chander also said that TikTok holds geopolitical importance and highlighted that the platform could even be used to ease strained U.S.-China relations.
"While much of the attention has been focused on Trump's tariff strategy, the TikTok ban is part of what some are calling the 'tech Cold War' between the two countries," he said.
"If Trump can save TikTok in the United States, it would help ease tensions between the two countries," Chander added.
The president-elect’s promise to “save TikTok” might not be as simple as his words suggest. Within the pool of his proposed Cabinet members is a discordant stance on the validity and necessity of a TikTok ban.
Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s choice for director of national intelligence, has over a million followers on TikTok, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., his choice for secretary of Health and Human Services, has more than 3 million followers. Both have publicly criticized legislation that would force the sale of TikTok or impose a ban.
But Senator Marco Rubio, Trump’s nominee for secretary of state, has previously called for a complete ban on TikTok, describing it as a "spyware" tool for China. Brendan Carr, Trump's nominee for Federal Communications Commission chairman, told Time magazine in November 2022 that he "can't see a path forward without a ban" and that TikTok poses a "huge national security risk."
The variance in Republican attitudes toward TikTok reflects a broader trend within the Republican stance toward China that will color the foreign policy pursuits of the new administration, according to Dirks.
“While some Republicans are foreign policy hawks who see Beijing as the paramount threat facing the United States, others are America First nationalists with little appetite for leveraging U.S. power to support East Asian democracies like Taiwan. These two sides will jockey for Trump’s support under his second presidency, much as they did under his first term in office,” he told VOA.
Still, despite the Biden administration’s imperative to change American policy on TikTok, and Trump’s own attempts to ban the platform and internal division, Chander said that Trump will most likely hold true to his word to protect the social media platform.
“President Trump will not want to begin his term breaking his promise to save TikTok. He will try to obtain some additional concessions from TikTok about how they manage their algorithm and the data of U.S. residents,” he said.
TikTok denies being controlled by or sharing data with the Chinese government.
