After TikTok went dark for users in the US in January, an executive order signed by newly sworn-in President Donald Trump gave the platform a reprieve from the law requiring ByteDance to sell to an owner outside China in order to remain accessible to US users. That executive order expires on April 5, but Trump has told Reuters that he expects a deal on the app’s sale to come before that deadline.
During an interview aboard Air Force One, Trump indicated that the app had several interested buyers. A law passed in 2024 required the short-form video app to sell to an owner outside of China by January 19 or face a ban for the 170 million users in the US. An executive order signed on January 20 gave the company until April 5 to meet those requirements.
“We have a lot of potential buyers, there’s tremendous interest in TikTok. The decision is going to be my decision, as you know, through Congress, and they’ve given me the power to make the decision,” he said. “We’re dealing with China who also want it because they may have something to do with it. And we’ll see how that goes. But it’s something I think you are going to have. I’d like to see TikTok remain alive.”
TikTok has not commented on whether or not the company is considering a sale. During a Supreme Court case, ByteDance lawyers indicated that a sale wouldn’t be possible, noting that some of the app’s programming is intellectual property owned by the Chinese government.
The law, Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, passed in 2024 with bipartisan support. Congress expressed national security concerns that ByteDance could be required to turn over user data to the government. Trump originally imposed sanctions against TikTok during his first term, but later reversed course. After joining the platform in 2024, Trump now has more than 15 million followers on the app.
According to USA Today, another executive order to delay the ban is possible.
