Trump to ban Tiktok’s operations in America
IN THE WORKS Bytedance, Tiktok’s Chinese owner, is reportedly ready to sell off the app’s US ops to avert the looming ban
nWASHINGTON:IN a further escalation of tensions between Washington, DC and Beijing, US President Donald Trump said on Friday the American government will ban the Chinese video-sharing app Tiktok over national security concerns.
“As far as Tiktok is concerned, we’re banning them from the United States,” Trump told reporters. “Well, I have that authority. I can do it with an executive order or that,” he added, referring to emergency economic powers.
According to reports, just before Air Force One landed in Washington, DC from a visit to Florida, Trump said he “will sign the document tomorrow”.
China’s Bytedance, which owns Tiktok, has reportedly agreed to divest the app’s US operations completely in a bid to save a deal with the White House, after Trump announced his decision to ban the app.
Trump’s move could also jeopardise a potential bid from Microsoft, which had reportedly been exploring an acquisition of Tiktok’s US operations, according to people familiar with the matter.
The US has of late been weighing action against Chinese apps, as stated earlier by Trump and secretary of state Mike Pompeo, as a part of the broader effort to force the Chinese government to “change its behaviour”.
Tiktok has hired almost 1,000 people in the US this year and will be employing another 10,000 into “great paying jobs” across the country, a company spokeswoman said in a statement.
The business’s $1 billion creator fund also supports people in the country who are building livelihoods from the platform, she added.
In another development, Trump’s 2019 financial disclosure showed that revenue declined slightly at some of his resorts even before pandemic began.