U.S. President, Donald Trump, on Friday extended the deadline for the sale of ByteDance’s U.S. assets of short video app TikTok, saying “tremendous progress” had been made but more work was needed to secure approvals.
Trump added that he looked forward to working with TikTok and China to close the deal, and that he did not want the app to “go dark.”
Trump had earlier said that the TikTok Deal was stalled by China’s objections to new US Tariffs.
“We had a deal pretty much for TikTok — not a deal but pretty close — and then China changed the deal because of tariffs,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One as he returned to Washington after a long weekend in Florida. “If I gave a little cut in tariffs they would have approved that deal in 15 minutes, which shows the power of tariffs.”
TikTok, which has more than 170 million American users, is under threat from a US law that passed overwhelmingly last year and orders the video streaming app to split from its Chinese owner ByteDance or get shut down in the United States.
Trump has insisted his administration is near a deal to find a buyer for TikTok and keep it from shutting down that would involve multiple investors, but has given few details.
Motivated by national security fears and belief in Washington that TikTok is controlled by the Chinese government, the ban took effect on January 19, one day before Trump’s inauguration.
In the hours before that deadline, TikTok temporarily shut down in the United States and disappeared from app stores, to the dismay of millions of users.
But the Republican president quickly announced an initial 75-day delay and TikTok subsequently restored service to users, returning to the Apple and Google app stores in February.
The new 75-day delay pushes the deadline to June 19.
Trump has repeatedly downplayed risks that TikTok is in danger, saying he remains confident of finding a buyer for the app’s US business.
