TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew will attend President-elect Trump's inauguration next week, a day after a ban on the video-sharing platform could go into effect in the U.S., according to people familiar with the plans. It is said that
Chu will join a growing list of technology executives expected to attend the inauguration in a bid to curry favor with Trump as he returns to the Oval Office. Trump allies Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos attended Monday's event. He is reportedly one of the technology leaders expected to do so.
The inauguration comes a day after TikTok's ban could come into effect on Sunday if TikTok's parent company, China's ByteDance, does not sell the app or the Supreme Court blocks enforcement of the anti-sale law.
The ban passed Congress with an overwhelming bipartisan majority and was signed by President Biden last April, giving TikTok until January 19th to withdraw from ByteDance or face a ban in the US. It will become something.
TikTok has not publicly announced what users can expect on Sunday if the ban goes into effect, but information On Tuesday, the company claimed it would immediately shut down the app for U.S. users if the ban goes through.
The Supreme Court took up TikTok's legal challenge on an expedited schedule, hearing oral arguments last week. The justices have expressed sympathy for the government's national security concerns about ByteDance, but have not yet issued an opinion on the issue.
President Trump has also praised the platform, and incoming national security adviser Mike Walz said Wednesday that the president-elect will take action to preserve TikTok once he returns to office.
“TikTok itself is a great platform,” Walz told Fox News. “I wish we could put it in our phones. The algorithms are amazing. We're going to find a way to protect people's data while preserving it. And that's the deal in front of us. ”
Shortly after, Waltz appeared on Fox News' “Special Report” with Bret Bayer. The Washington Post reported President Trump was considering various options to save TikTok in the face of an impending ban, including an executive order.
Mr. Chu met with Mr. Trump last month at the Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida.
TikTok did not immediately respond to The Hill's request for comment.
