Trump has promised to 'save TikTok'. What happens next is less clear

After a tumultuous year filled with anxiety and a legal battle about its future in the U.S., TikTok may have just been thrown a lifeline by the man who was once its biggest foe: Donald Trump.

President-elect Trump, who tried to ban the social media platform the last time he was in the White House, has repeatedly pledged during his most recent campaign to oppose a ban on the short-form video app, which could happen as soon as mid-January if the company loses a court case that’s currently underway in Washington.

For months, TikTok, and its China-based parent company ByteDance, have been embroiled in a legal battle with the U.S. over a federal law that forces them to cut ties for national security reasons or stop operating in one of their biggest markets in the world. The measure, signed by President Joe Biden in April, gives ByteDance nine months to divest its stakes, with a possible three-month extension if a sale was in progress. If that happens, the deadline could be extended into the first 100 days of Trump’s presidency.

The companies have claimed that divestiture is not possible, and the law, if upheld, would force them to shut down by Jan. 19, just a day before Trump’s second inauguration. Attorneys for both sides have asked a federal appeals court reviewing the case to issue a ruling by Dec. 6. The losing side is expected to appeal to the Supreme Court, which has a conservative majority and could decide to take up the case, potentially dragging out the process even longer.

When reached for comment, the Trump transition team did not offer details on how Trump plans to carry out his pledge to “save TikTok,” as he said on a Truth Social post in September while encouraging people who care about the platform to vote for him. But Karoline Leavitt, a spokeswoman for the transition team, indicated in a statement that he plans to see it through.

“The American people re-elected President Trump by a resounding margin giving him a mandate to implement the promises he made on the campaign trail,” Leavitt said. “He will deliver.”

During a March interview with CNBC, Trump said he still believed TikTok posed a national security risk but opposed banning it because doing so would help its rival, Facebook, which he has continued to lambast over his 2020 election loss. He also denied changing his mind on the issue because of Republican megadonor Jeff Yass, a ByteDance investor that Trump, at the time, said that he had only met “very briefly.” He said Yass “never mentioned TikTok” during their meeting.

Still, ByteDance – and groups connected to Yass – have been attempting to exert their influence. Lobbying disclosure reports show that this year, ByteDance paid veteran lobbyist and former Trump campaign aide David Urban $150,000 to lobby lawmakers in Washington in favor of TikTok. The company has also spent more than $8 million on in-house lobbyists and another $1.4 million on other lobbying firms, according to Open Secrets.

Meanwhile, in March, Politico reported Kellyanne Conway, a former senior Trump aide, was being paid by the Yass-funded conservative group Club for Growth to advocate for TikTok in Congress. A spokesperson for the organization said Conway was hired as a consultant to conduct polling. Conway and Urban did not respond to requests for comment. TikTok, which has long denied it’s a national security risk, declined to comment.

If the courts uphold the law, it would fall on Trump’s Justice Department to enforce it and punish any potential violations with fines. The fines would apply to app stores that would be prohibited from offering TikTok, and internet hosting services who would be barred from supporting it. Leah Plunkett, a lecturer at Harvard Law School, said from her reading of the statute, the attorney general has to investigate violations but can decide whether or not to drag such companies to court and force them to comply.

Trump could do other things to prevent TikTok from disappearing.

He could issue an executive order to nullify the ban — which Plunkett believes would not be lawful — or urge Congress to repeal the law. That would require support from Congressional Republicans who have aligned themselves with Trump but have also supported the prospects of getting TikTok out of the hands of a Chinese company.

In a statement sent to the AP after the election, Republican Rep. John Moolenaar of Michigan, chairman of the House Select Committee on China, said Trump’s “long-standing concerns” about TikTok align with the law’s requirement for divestment.

“The Trump Administration will have a unique opportunity to broker an American takeover of the platform,” he said.

ByteDance, though, has previously said it has no intention to sell the platform despite interest from some investors, including Trump’s former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. Analysts say the company is even less likely to sell the proprietary algorithm that fuels what users see on the app. That means even if TikTok is sold to a qualified buyer, it is likely to be a shell of its current self and would need to be rebuilt with new technology.

Sarah Kreps, director of Cornell University’s Tech Policy Institute, said it’s also possible that Trump could take the issue back to the drawing board and direct his administration to negotiate a new deal with TikTok.

TikTok said in 2022, it presented the Biden administration with a draft agreement that would bolster protections for users and provide it more oversight over the company’s U.S. operations. But the administration has argued in court documents in recent months that it would be challenging to enforce the agreement due to the size and the technical complexity of the platform.

Trump hasn’t been privy to new intelligence material on the matter for a few years and it's possible he could change his mind - and abandon his campaign promise - once he does, Kreps said.

Plunkett, the Harvard Law faculty and author of “Sharenthood: Why We Should Think before We Talk about Our Kids Online,” said if she were counseling TikTok, she would advise them to come up with a divesture plan that is compliant with the law and as favorable to them as possible.

“There is too much uncertainty about what a Trump administration is likely to do,” she said.