Let America own 50% of Tiktok, says Trump, giving Chinese app new life in US

Washington: TikTok is back in the US after President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday praised it and said let the government own 50 per cent of the popular short video sharing platform.

TikTok went dark in the US on Saturday night because of a legislation, but it was back within less than 24 hours after Trump vowed to issue an executive order on his first day in office to delay the enforcement of the law.

The short-video app is used by 170 million Americans.

"As of today, TikTok is back. You know, I did a little TikTok thing. We have a guy, TikTok Jack. He's a young kid, like 21 years old. We hired this guy and I went on TikTok. We went on TikTok as Republicans never won the youth vote. They won a lot of votes, but they never won the youth vote. But we won the youth vote by 36 points. So I like TikTok," Trump told his supporters at a victory rally here.

"Who in this audience goes with TikTok? Many? Frankly, we have no choice. We have to save a lot of jobs. We don't want to give our business to China. We don't want to give our business to other people," Trump added.

Stating that the solution to the TikTok issue is a joint venture, Trump said, "They did that a long time ago when they had a different president. They didn't know that I was going to be the president. So I said, very simply, a joint venture. If you don't approve, they're out of business. They're worth nothing. If you do approve, they're worth like a trillion dollars."

"So, I said, I'll approve, but let the United States own 50 per cent of TikTok. I'm approving on behalf of the nation. So, they'll have a partner, the United States, and they'll have a lot of bidders, and we will do what we call a joint venture deal," the President-elect said.

"We're not putting up any money. All we're doing is giving them the approval, without which they have nothing,” Trump said, adding, "Whether you like TikTok or not, we're going to make a lot of money."

Meanwhile, TikTok credited Trump's intervention for providing "clarity and assurance" to its service providers, enabling the app’s rapid return.

The law, signed by President Joe Biden last April, required ByteDance, TikTok’s Chinese parent company, to divest the app by January 19 to avoid a ban.

While Trump's move has sparked hope among TikTok users, questions remain about how he will reconcile his executive action with the legislation.