TikTok’s time may be winding down.
The proverbial clock is ticking with several probable outcomes imminent, according to recent reports and comments from President Donald Trump, who is expected this week to discuss a potential deal with ByteDance, the Chinese parent company and owner of the short-video app. He said the U.S. “pretty much” has a deal on its sale.
The most likely possibility: TikTok would launch a U.S. version of its platform to comply with a federal law last year designed to dissociate the app from ByteDance. The new version would purportedly launch by Sept. 5, ahead of ByteDance’s plan to shutter the current platform by March 2026. The idea is to preserve the app’s U.S. user base of 170 million while complying with the law and national security concerns.
“I think we’re gonna start Monday or Tuesday…talking to China, perhaps [Chinese] President Xi or one of his representatives, but we would, we pretty much have a deal,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One on July 4.
When pressed if China would agree to a deal, Trump said, “I’m not confident, but I think so. President Xi and I have a great relationship, and I think it’s good for them. I think the deal is good for China and it’s good for us.”
Spinning off TikTok’s operations in the U.S. into a new American-owned company was in the offing earlier this year, but it was put on hold after China backed out following Trump’s threat of steep tariffs on Chinese goods back in April. On Monday, Trump announced a fresh set of tariffs against more than a dozen countries, including Japan and South Korea, and yet another extension in tariff deadlines, this time to Aug. 1.
As for prospective buyers, Trump told Fox News in June they are a group of “very wealthy people” but did not mention any by name.
“We have a buyer for TikTok, by the way,” Trump said then. “I think I’ll need probably China’s approval. I think President Xi will probably do it.”
Of course, the latest stab at a deal could implode again if and when new tariffs are enacted. Or if Trump issues yet another pause, as he has with tariffs.
In mid-June, Trump granted TikTok yet another 90-day extension on a 2024 law under the Biden Administration that requires ByteDance to find a buyer for the platform or face a ban in the U.S. amid widespread national security concerns about the platform. The law mandates ByteDance not sell TikTok’s U.S. assets to Chinese owners.ย In early 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously upheld that law.
Trump’s series of 90-day executive orders pausing the fate of TikTok has sparked debate over what critics call flimsy legal reasoning by his administration to circumvent the law, The New York Times reported.
In a series of letters to Apple Inc., Alphabet Inc.’s Google, and others, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi privately argued that Trump had “national security” authority to set aside a broad range of laws as he wished, the Times reported. She concluded the law banning TikTok in the U.S. “is properly read not to infringe upon such core presidential national security and foreign affairs powers.”
