FOX Business' Taylor Riggs joins “Fox & Friends First” to discuss President-elect Trump's relationship with Big Tech, potential investment plans and his agenda for his first 100 days.
President-elect Donald Trump's multi-year turnaround on the Chinese-owned social media app TikTok culminated Sunday with him being recognized for saving the app.
Trump first administration It initially proposed banning the app or forcing it to be sold to non-Chinese owners, but those plans did not materialize until President Biden took office in 2020. At the time, a bipartisan group of lawmakers approved the bill and Biden signed it into law. -OR- Sale deadline is January 19th.
Up until this point, Trump and other politicians had agreed that TikTok posed a serious national security threat because it is owned by ByteDance, which benefits from the Chinese Communist Party. .
The app briefly went dark on Sunday because no purchase agreement had been reached, only for President Trump to intervene and promise to extend the deadline.
President-elect Donald Trump has called for an extension of TikTok's ban and sale deadline, which was originally set for January 19th. (Jaap Arrians/NurPhoto via Getty Images / Getty Images)
As a result, TikTok's 170 million U.S. users were instead shown a message thanking President Trump for his efforts to save the app.
Tiktok influencers lament platform after Supreme Court ruling, crying 'fuck this country'
“Welcome back!” read the TikTok message. “Thank you for your patience and support. As a result of President Trump's efforts, TikTok is back in the United States!”
Earlier Sunday, President Trump wrote on TRUTH Social that he was “asking companies not to leave TikTok in the dark.” He vowed to issue an executive order on Monday to extend the deadline for a ban or sale, but did not provide details on the extension.
President Biden has allowed legislation to ban the sale of TikTok to proceed under his administration. (Reuters)
“By doing this, we will save TikTok and keep it in good hands so we can do that. [stay] above. Without US approval, TikTok would not exist. If approved by us, it would be worth hundreds of billions of dollars, perhaps trillions of dollars,” President Trump wrote. “Thus, my first thought is that current owners and/or new owners This is a joint venture between the United States and our selected purchaser, in which the United States acquires a 50% ownership interest. ”
President Trump's new endorsement of TikTok comes after the company's CEO, Shou Chiu, visited the president-elect at his Mar-a-Lago home in December.
TikTok shouts out Trump as app goes dark for millions of users nationwide
TikTok later released another statement from its account regarding X, once again thanking the president-elect.
TikTok welcomed users back to the social media platform after President-elect Donald Trump vowed to push through an executive order delaying the ban. (Reuters/Reuters Photo)
“Please provide us with the clarity and assurance we need to provide our service providers with the clarity and assurance they need that there will be no penalties to bring TikTok to over 170 million Americans and enable over 7 million small businesses to thrive. We thank President Trump for his support,” he said in a statement. “This is a strong position in support of the First Amendment and against arbitrary censorship. We will work with President Trump on a long-term solution to keep TikTok in the United States.” ”
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Despite the extension, Byte Dance is I repeatedly rejected offers to sell the app. The company has not considered whether it supports the type of shared ownership that Trump has described.
Fox Business' Daniel Wallace contributed to this report.
