The US President, speaking in an interview with Fox News on Sunday, said the deal he is developing would probably need China’s approval to move forward, and predicted Chinese President Xi Jinping “will probably do it”.
A deal had been in the works this spring that would have spun off TikTok’s US operations into a new US-based firm, majority-owned and operated by US investors. But the deal fell apart after China indicated it would not approve it following Trump’s announcements of steep tariffs on Chinese goods.
“We have a buyer for TikTok, by the way,” Trump said. “I think I’ll need probably China’s approval. I think President Xi will probably do it.”
The US Congress passed a law forcing TikTok to stop operating by 19 January, unless parent company ByteDance had completed divesting the app’s US assets or demonstrated significant progress toward a sale.
China-based ByteDance to divest its US assets of TikTok under US law (Photo: Cheng Xin/Getty)
Trump, who credits the app with boosting his support among young voters in last November’s presidential election, has extended the deadline three times.
The most recent extension in April was for a reported 50 per cent sale of the app to American buyers.
What is TikTok’s relationship with the Chinese Government?
Like with most major companies in China, the ruling Communist Party has set up a party branch at ByteDance, which has led to concerns about Beijing’s influence over the company.
More than 170 million Americans have TikTok accounts, it is estimated.
To try to alleviate concerns, TikTok started to host its American user data in the US firm Oracle’s cloud infrastructure from 2020, but US lawmakers have still insisted on the part sale.
Vance’s office and TikTok were approached for comment.
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