Trump Warns Fate Of TikTok Deal Could Impact China Tariffs—Beijing Signals It May Not Block Sale
Key Facts
On Monday evening, Trump signed an executive order to halt the TikTok ban for 75 days “to permit my Administration an opportunity to determine the appropriate course of action” on the platform's fate.
Trump said he expects China to approve any deal the U.S. would want to make with TikTok, “because we’d put tariffs on China…I’m not saying we would, but we certainly could do that.”
The president said the U.S. “should be entitled to get half of TikTok” if it continued to operate after the 75-day extension and said the platform is “worthless if I don’t approve it.”
Trump warned if China blocked the deal, “then that’s a certain hostility and we’ll put tariffs of 25, 30, 50%, even 100%.”
The president claimed TikTok could be worth as much as a trillion dollars if “we would have a joint venture with the people from TikTok.”
What We Don’t Know About Trump’s Planned Tiktok Deal?
It is unclear if the president wants the U.S. government to own half of TikTok, or if he means 50% of the social media platform should be owned by a U.S. company. Trump also did not specify if he expects TikTok’s Chinese parent ByteDance to give up 50% of TikTok’s ownership to the U.S. in exchange for being allowed to operate in the country, or if he wants it to agree to a sale.
What About His Planned Tariffs?
In November, Trump said tariffs against all imports from China, Mexico and Canada would be among the first executive orders he would sign after entering office. The president did not sign any tariffs-related executive orders on Monday, but warned that a 25% levy on all imports from Canada and Mexico will likely go into effect on February 1. Speaking to reporters from the Oval Office, Trump continued to accuse the two U.S. neighbors of enabling the flow of drugs and undocumented immigrants into the country. The president, however, did not commit to imposing tariffs on China, aside from the TikTok threat, and said: “We’re going to have meetings and calls with President Xi.” Trump also confirmed he has been invited to visit China this year and said he is open to it.
What Has China Said About A Tiktok Sale?
Any sale of TikTok will need to be approved by Beijing as such a deal is likely to include TikTok’s algorithm which is covered by China’s export control rules on ‘personalized content recommendation’ tools. Chinese authorities had previously said they would block any forced TikTok sale. However, Beijing struck a softer tone on the matter on Monday with Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning: “For such actions as corporate operations and acquisitions, we always believe that they should be decided independently by companies based on market principles.”
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