Trump to Meet Potential Buyers as TikTok Faces Ban Deadline
President Donald Trump is conducting a discussion with his staff regarding potential investors interested in acquiring a share of TikTok. This arrangement has the possibility to prevent the social media platform from facing a ban within U.S. borders.
A individual acquainted with the circumstances disclosed the specifics of the Wednesday gathering, requesting confidentiality to talk about private discussions within the organization.
Uncertainty surrounded the widely-used video application following a new regulation implemented on January 19th. This rule mandated that ByteDance, TikTok’s Chinese parent company based in Beijing, relinquish control due to potential national security issues. Upon assuming his position, President Trump extended an olive branch to TikTok with a 75-day postponement through an executive order. The directive pushed back the deadline for compliance—either selling off the platform or facing de facto prohibition—to April 5th.
Potential backers include the software corporation Oracle as well as the investment entity Blackstone.
It is expected that Vice President JD Vance, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, White House National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard will be attending the Oval Office meeting with Trump on Wednesday.
CBS News initially reported on the gathering.
On Sunday, as he traveled aboard Air Force One, President Trump told reporters he "would like to see TikTok stay operational." Earlier, he had suggested that lowering trade barriers with China could be considered if his administration approved the app’s acquisition.
In his initial term, Trump attempted to prohibit TikTok citing national security concerns; however, this action was stopped by judicial intervention prior to his administration's efforts to arrange a sale of the platform, an arrangement that ultimately did not come through. Later, he altered his stance on the widely used app around the time of the previous year's presidential election and attributes its use as instrumental in attracting a greater number of younger voters to support him.
I secured the youth vote by 36 percentage points. Young people typically don't favor Republicans," he stated on Sunday. "A significant portion of this support might be attributed to TikTok.
Trump has said that the deadline on a TikTok deal could be extended further if needed. He previously proposed terms in which the US would have a 50% stake in a joint venture. The administration hasn’t provided details on what that type of deal would entail.
TikTok and ByteDance have not made any public statements regarding these discussions. Additionally, it remains uncertain whether ByteDance has altered its stance on potentially selling TikTok, as they previously stated at the beginning of last year that they had no intention to do so.
What is scheduled to occur on April 5th?
If TikTok fails to find an acceptable purchaser by April 5th, the initial legislation banning it across the country will come back into play. Nonetheless, the due date specified in the executive order isn’t firmly fixed, and the president has emphasized that it might be pushed back as necessary.
Trump’s order came a few days after the Supreme Court unanimously upheld a federal law that required ByteDance to divest or be banned in January. The day after the ruling, TikTok went dark for US users and came back online after Trump vowed to stall the ban.
The decision to keep TikTok alive through an executive order has received some scrutiny, but it has not faced a legal challenge in court.
Who is interested in purchasing TikTok?
While it remains uncertain whether ByteDance intends to offload TikTok, numerous prospective buyers have emerged over the last several months.
Assistants working under Vice President JD Vance, who has been tasked with overseeing a possible agreement, have contacted certain entities like the artificial intelligence startup Perplexity AI to gather more information regarding their proposals. According to someone knowledgeable about these discussions, in January, Perplexity AI proposed merging with ByteDance, which would unite Perplexity’s operations with those of TikTok within the U.S.
Other possible contenders include a group led by wealthy entrepreneur Frank McCourt, who has recently brought aboard Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian as a strategic advisor. The investors backing this coalition have reportedly proposed offering ByteDance $20 billion (€18.5bn) in cash for ownership of TikTok’s U.S. operations. Should they succeed, their intention is to revamp the widely used application using blockchain tech, claiming it would grant users greater authority over their digital information.
Jesse Tinsley, who founded the payroll company Employer.com, also mentions that he has put together a group including the CEO of the video game platform Roblox. This coalition is proposing to offerByteDance over $30 billion (€27.7bn) for TikTok.
In January, Trump mentioned that Microsoft was considering acquiring the widely-used application. Potential buyers included Steven Mnuchin, his ex-Treasury Secretary, along with Rumble—a video platform favored by certain conservative and far-right factions. Posting on X back in March, Rumble announced their readiness to be part of a group aiming to buy TikTok and act as a technology collaborator for the firm.