TikTok users in the United States gained partial access to the popular social media app on Sunday, just hours before the presidential election Donald Trump the promised reinstatement order was expected to take effect.
Earlier on Saturday, the app was shut down after the US Supreme Court refused to save TikTok from a new law requiring its owner, ByteDance, to sell the popular short video app to a US company – the first such action against the widely used social media site.
Trump, who is scheduled to be sworn in on Monday, he promised issue an executive order immediately after taking office and give the company more time to comply. On Sunday, during a rally held on the eve of his inaugurationTrump announced that “as of today, TikTok is coming back” and credited it with winning over young voters in November’s general election.
Here’s what you need to know about the ban and Trump’s promise:
How did Trump get the TikTok ban overturned?
President-elect Trump, who previously supported a ban on TikTok, vowed on Sunday to issue an executive order temporarily halting the federal ban.
In a post on his Truth Social platform, Trump said the order would “extend the period before legal bans take effect” and allow TikTok to find a US company with which to share 50 percent ownership.
Trump previously said in media interviews that the order would last for the first 90 days.
Does TikTok work in the US now?
TikTok confirmed it was “in the process of restoring service” in a statement on Sunday on X. The company also thanked Trump for providing “clarity and assurances to our service providers that they will not face penalties.”
According to the American news outlet NPR, TikTok’s hosting providers, Oracle and Akamai, have also restored their services.
US users were greeted with a “welcome back” message on the app on Sunday and can now use it. The message read in part: “As a result of President Trump’s efforts, TikTok is back in the US.”
Earlier on Saturday, users accessing the site could only see a notice that read: “A law has been passed in the US to ban TikTok. Unfortunately, that means you can’t use TikTok for now.”
TikTok president Shou Zi Chew also sent a memo to advertisers on Sunday, saying the app would be back online for “most US users,” according to a report by technology website The Verge. “We anticipate temporary service instability that could affect US advertising,” he wrote, including live advertising campaigns.
Is TikTok back on app stores?
Not yet. New downloads through Google or Apple’s app stores were not possible until Monday, and potentially only users who downloaded the app before the ban could access it. Google said it had paused the downloads and cited “US legal requirements.”
Meanwhile, the Apple store said the TikTok and ByteDance apps “are not available in the country or region you are in.”
The law to ban TikTok provides heavy fines for companies that provide support services for the company.
Why is the app banned?
Concerns about TikTok have been around for years. In 2020, Trump, then US president, led failed initial attempts to ban the platform and pushed Microsoft to buy it. At the time, however, TikTok agreed to partner with Oracle in data protection technology.
Republicans and Democrats have continued to push for a ban on TikTok on national security and privacy concerns. Officials have claimed that the Chinese government can access the data of more than 170 million US users through parent company ByteDance and can manipulate the algorithm to push Chinese propaganda.
In March 2023, Congress on the grill TikTok president Chew for five hours, questioning China’s alleged influence on the app. Chew insisted that there is no evidence that the Chinese government accessed or sought data to access the data of US users.
However, in March 2024, lawmakers passed the Protecting Americans from Controlled Foreign Adversary Applications Act (PAFACA). According to him, ByteDance was given an ultimatum: either hand over ownership to an American entity or stop working. In April, outgoing US President Joe Biden signed the bill into law. The new policy gave TikTok a deadline of January 19, 2025 to comply with or be banned.
TikTok challenged the ban in an appeals court and then in the US Supreme Court, arguing that it violates the right to free speech. On Friday, court supported the law in a stunning blow to the company. Other ByteDance apps, such as video editing app CapCut and video sharing platform Lemon8, were also blacklisted.
Are there allegations of racial scapegoating?
Analysts have expressed concern over what they say is perceived bias in the case, noting that other social media sites pose similar data mining risks, but that Tiktok has been singled out because it is owned by Chinese entrepreneurs.
Some Chinese Americans in particular have labeled the ban as prejudice and an example of racial scapegoating. There are fears that other Chinese-owned companies, such as Alipay, could also be targeted if the ban on TikTok remains.
Human rights groups such as Asian Americans Advancing Justice (AAJC) strongly opposed the ban, calling it “xenophobic”.
“Calls to single out and ban TikTok for the privacy violations regularly committed by US-owned companies like Meta and Alphabet are grossly hypocritical and steeped in xenophobia,” the AAJC said in a statement after the bill was signed into law last April.
What were the reactions to Trump’s order?
Some Republican lawmakers objected to Trump’s announcement. On Sunday, Senators Tom Cotton and Pete Ricketts, in a joint statement, said there was no legal basis for “any ‘extension'” unless ByteDance agreed to sever “ties” between TikTok and China.
Senators praised Apple, Google, Microsoft and Amazon for complying with the law. “We encourage other companies to do the same,” they added, warning that companies that cooperate with TikTok risk “crushing bankruptcy.”
Elon Musk, the founder of X and a close ally of Trump, spoke out against the TikTok ban, which he said could infringe on freedom of speech and expression. On Sunday, Musk reiterated his stance, but said “the current situation where TikTok is allowed to operate in America but X is not allowed to operate in China is unbalanced.”
Twitter is also officially banned in China. Businesses and government accounts use the platform, but only through a government-approved virtual private network (VPN).
Nevertheless, at a press conference on Monday, Chinese Foreign Minister Mao Ning called on the US to ensure an “open, free, fair and non-discriminatory” business environment, saying TikTok has boosted US employment.
Ning also reacted to Musk’s statement, saying, “We welcome the development of internet enterprises from all countries in China as long as they abide by Chinese laws and regulations and provide safe and reliable products and services.”
