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If Trump Wants To ‘Save’ TikTok, He Might Need It To Get Banned First
President-elect Donald Trump has repeatedly promised to “save” TikTok, the popular short-form video-sharing app. However, in order for him to fulfill this promise, it’s possible that he might need to allow the ban of TikTok first.
The Supreme Court is currently reviewing a request from ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, to stay a law that could take the app offline as early as January 19th. If this law goes into effect without an injunction, Trump would have the opportunity to appear to be saving the app by giving its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, a one-time three-month extension to facilitate a sale of TikTok to a non-Chinese firm.
As it stands, Trump’s authority is limited in this situation. The law specifically prohibits him from signing off on an agreement that addresses national security concerns, such as data sharing limitations and algorithm audits. However, if the ban goes into effect without an injunction, he could use his executive power to bring the app back online with the aforementioned one-time extension.
In this scenario, Trump would be able to appear to have saved TikTok, while also avoiding any responsibility for allowing the app’s shutdown in the first place. He will then be able to blame the outgoing President Biden for the initial shutdown and claim credit for bringing it back online.
Source: http://www.forbes.com
