USA: On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump said that he was open to Tesla CEO Elon Musk buying TikTok if he wanted to, according to Reuters.
This comes as the short video app, used by 170 million Americans, was temporarily banned after the US government pushed for its sale over national security concerns. The law, which would either force TikTok’s Chinese owner ByteDance to sell the app or ban it, took effect on Sunday, leading to a 12-hour ban of TikTok in the US.
Last week, Chinese officials were reportedly in talks of possibly selling TikTok’s operations in the US to Mr Musk, though Reuters reported that TikTok had denied this.
On Monday, US President Trump signed an executive order to delay the TikTok ban by 75 days. However, as of Tuesday afternoon, TikTok was still unavailable for download on Apple and Android devices in the US.
When asked if he was open to Mr Musk buying the app, US President Trump said, “I would be if he wanted to buy it.”
He added that he had met with the big owners of TikTok. “So, what I am thinking about saying to somebody is ‘buy it and give half to the United States of America,’” he said.
Free speech advocates have criticised the US ban on TikTok, which was enacted through a law passed by Congress and signed by former President Biden.
TikTok argues that US officials have misstated its connection to China, stating that its content recommendation engine and user data are stored in the US on cloud servers managed by Oracle and that content moderation for American users is done within the US.
Mr Musk, who supported US President Trump’s presidential campaign with over US$250 million, said that while he has long opposed a TikTok ban, citing concerns over freedom of speech, he pointed out that the current situation, where TikTok is allowed to operate in the US, is “unbalanced” compared to X, his platform, which is not allowed to operate in China. /TISG
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