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Biden won’t enforce ban on TikTok, White House official says

The administration will leave it up to President-elect Trump to enforce the ban when he takes office on Monday.

The administration will leave it up to President-elect Trump to enforce the ban when he takes office on Monday.

TikTok, owned by ByteDance, allows users to share short-form video content. (Photo via Unsplash)
TikTok, owned by ByteDance, allows users to share short-form video content. (Photo via Unsplash)

The federal government under President Joe Biden has no plans to enforce a law that requires TikTok’s parent company ByteDance to divest the part of its business that operates in the United States, according to a report published on Thursday.

The report, from ABC News, comes just days before the law takes effect, which forces app stores operated by Google, Amazon, Apple, Samsung, Microsoft and others to stop allowing its users to download the TikTok app after Sunday if ByteDance does not sell its domestic operations to a U.S.-based company.



The law was passed last year as part of a broader appropriations bill meant to provide financial funding to Ukraine and Israel for their ongoing military conflicts. Biden signed the law into effect, beginning the countdown clock for ByteDance to sell its business, which it has refused to do.

Instead, ByteDance has challenged the matter in court, arguing that the law violates the First Amendment of its business and that of millions of American TikTok users. So far, the company has found little success in court, with its request for an injunction that would have prevented the law from taking effect being denied by a federal district court judge and, later, by an appellate court.



The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review the injunction and held a hearing on the matter last week, but the justices seemed willing to allow the law to take effect. A decision on the matter is likely to come on Friday, just two days before the law kicks in.

Even if the Supreme Court doesn’t find in favor of TikTok, it might not signal the end of TikTok’s availability in the United States. According to ABC News, the Biden administration has no plans to enforce the sale of the business, or the app store ban, if ByteDance fails to divest its business by Sunday.



Instead, the Biden administration will leave it to the incoming administration of President-elect Donald Trump to enforce the ban, should he choose to do so. Trump, who previously sided with a TikTok ban during his first term in office, has recently indicated a willingness to find a solution that allows TikTok to continue distributing its app in U.S.-based software stores.

“Our position on this has been clear: TikTok should continue to operate under American ownership,” a White House spokesperson told ABC News. “Given the timing of when it goes into effect over a holiday weekend a day before inauguration, it will be up to the next administration to implement.”

Even if the Trump administration does take a hands-off approach, American tech companies may choose to remove the TikTok app from their app stores on their own. The companies face large fines each day TikTok is available to download in their app stores after Sunday if ByteDance doesn’t sell its U.S. business operations.

Nothing in the law requires TikTok to shut down its service, and Americans with the app installed before Sunday can continue to use it, so long as it remains operational. But its future would remain far from certain, because Google and Apple — the tech companies that dominate the domestic market for phones and tablets — issue security and operating system updates on a regular basis, and apps sometimes have to issue updates of their own in order to continue working with those devices.

Oracle, which provides the underlying technology that powers some of TikTok, would also be prevented from providing its services to the company while the ban is in place, which could also disrupt the availability of TikTok in the U.S.

Officials at Google, Apple and Oracle have not commented on the matter.

President Biden or President-elect Trump could delay the law before it takes effect on Sunday by granting a 90-day moratorium, but only if ByteDance has proven that it is on a “path to executing” a divestiture of its business. Previously, ByteDance has said that the Chinese government would not give it approval to do so, though recent reports indicated Chinese officials had discussed with their counterparts in the Trump administration about selling off its U.S.-based business, including one that involves Elon Musk acquiring TikTok and running it with his social platform X (formerly Twitter).

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About the Author:

Matthew Keys

Matthew Keys is a nationally-recognized, award-winning journalist who has covered the business of media, technology, radio and television for more than 11 years. He is the publisher of The Desk and contributes to Know Techie, Digital Content Next and StreamTV Insider. He previously worked for Thomson Reuters, the Walt Disney Company, McNaughton Newspapers and Tribune Broadcasting. Connect with Matthew on LinkedIn by clicking or tapping here.
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