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President-elect Donald Trump said he would “most likely” extend a deadline for ByteDance, the Chinese owner of TikTok, to divest itself of the video app facing a nationwide ban that is set to take effect on Sunday.
In an interview with NBC News, Trump said he was considering extending the 90-day deadline. His comments come a day later TikTok warned that its 170 million customers would face imminent power outages after the Supreme Court on Friday upheld a forfeiture or ban law passed by Congress last year to address national security concerns linked to China.
“The 90-day extension is something that will most likely be done because it’s appropriate,” Trump said. “We have to look at it carefully. It’s a very big situation. . . If I decide to do it, I’ll probably announce it on Monday.”
On Friday, Trump said he spoke with President Xi Jinping and discussed TikTok with the Chinese leader. Chinese state media said the two leaders spoke, but did not specify whether TikTok was part of the conversation.
The Biden administration said Friday that it would leave decisions on implementing the law, which takes effect Saturday at midnight ET, to the incoming Trump administration.
That means companies that provide the video platform — including Apple, Google and Oracle — must decide whether to risk breaking the law between the midnight deadline and Trump’s inauguration on Monday.
TikTok said the Biden administration’s statements “failed to provide the necessary clarity and assurance to service providers who are integral to keeping TikTok available to more than 170 million Americans.”
It also warned that the video app would “go dark” on January 19 unless the Biden administration “immediately provides a definitive statement to satisfy the most critical service providers and guarantee non-implementation.”
In a major bipartisan vote last March, Congress passed legislation requiring ByteDance to divest from TikTok to avoid a nationwide ban on the app.
Lawmakers and US security officials believe Chinese ownership of the app poses a national security risk because the Chinese Communist Party could use it for espionage and disinformation. TikTok has denied that the Chinese government has any influence over the app.
In his first term, Trump issued an executive order to block TikTok from operating in the US, but the courts blocked it at the last minute. In early 2024, he spoke out against a congressional takedown or ban measure on the grounds that it would help Facebook, which banned him from its social media platform for two years.
Trump has named several China hawks opposed to China’s ownership of TikTok to his administration, including Mike Waltz, a former Green Beret and Florida congressman, to serve as national security adviser.
Earlier this week, Waltz said the new administration would introduce “measures to keep TikTok from going dark,” saying the law allowed for an extension as long as a “sustainable deal” was on the table.
Following TikTok’s statement on Friday, Rush Doshi, a former top Biden administration official in China, wrote on X that the company had only itself to blame.
“TikTok had 268 days to sell so it wasn’t controlled by China. That would solve everything. But they didn’t even try. China would not allow them to do that,” said Doshi.
“Now, in a short amount of time, they want Biden to ignore a bipartisan SCOTUS (U.S. Supreme Court) 9-0 upheld bill. If they close, it’s up to them.”
