President Trump said Tuesday (Sept. 1) that he told people involved in the sale of the overseas version of Shakespeare’s TikTok that the deal must close by Sept. 15 and that the U.S. government must be “well compensated” or the U.S. operations of TikTok, which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance, will be shut down.
“I told them they have to have an agreement by Sept. 15 – after that we’re going to shut it down in this country,” Trump said Tuesday aboard Air Force One. ” said Genosha, who traveled to Wisconsin, before speaking to the media. “I said the United States must be compensated, well compensated. Because we made it possible. So we should be compensated, so the treasury must be fully compensated.”
Trump has also previously said the deal to buy TikTok should make the U.S. treasury compensated.
White House studies how to get compensated
It is unclear how the U.S. will be compensated for the deal to sell TikTok. Trump believes the U.S. should be rewarded for having to address the threat TikTok poses to national security, and the administration is looking at ways to be compensated from any deal struck, according to Bloomberg News, people with knowledge of the matter said. White House staff have looked into receiving the money from the company’s compliance cost, one person with knowledge of the matter said. Compliance costs are all expenses incurred by companies to comply with industry regulations.
The U.S. collects fees for deals that are reviewed by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), but the fees typically don’t exceed $300,000, an amount that appears to be far less than Trump wants to be compensated for.
Beijing’s New Rules Make Deals More Complicated
Microsoft Corp. has teamed up with Walmart Inc. to bid against Oracle Corp. that is also interested in acquiring TikTok’s U.S. assets.
At the same time, the sale of TikTok has been complicated by new regulations just introduced in China that restrict technology exports. Experts in China say the new rules mean that Beijing’s approval will be needed before Byte Jump can sell TikTok’s U.S. business.
CNBC reported Monday that a deal to buy TikTok could be announced as early as Tuesday, but BytePop would not comment on the news. We have not seen any official announcement of the deal.
40% of Americans Support President’s Blocking Order
At the same time, a Reuters/Ipsos national poll shows that 40% of Americans support President Trump’s executive order to ban TikTok if it is not sold to U.S. buyers. 30% of those surveyed said they oppose the move.
Responses to this question were decidedly partisan, and many of those who approved of Trump’s executive order said they did not know much about TikTok. For example, 69 percent of Republicans surveyed said they supported Trump’s executive order, but only 32 percent said they were familiar with the application.
Trump issued an executive order on August 14, citing the threat TikTok poses to U.S. national security and ordering its parent company, ByteHopper, to sell the app in the U.S. within 90 days. TikTok has filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration to block the ban, which the company claims is unconstitutional and unlawful. The company claims that the move is unconstitutional and politically motivated.
According to data provided by TikTok, the platform for creating and sharing short videos has grown rapidly in the U.S., from about 11 million monthly active users in January 2018 to 100 million today. Global use of the app has risen from 55 million in January 2018 to nearly 2 billion.
Navarro: White House will act on more Chinese apps
On the other hand, White House trade adviser Navarro said the White House will also take action against more Chinese apps after issuing blocking orders against Chinese apps Shakespeare Overseas TikTok and WeChat Overseas Wechat.
“It is important that this country does not use apps made in China, or those that can take our data to Chinese servers. That data will be used to spy on, monitor and track you,” Navarro said in an interview with Fox Business Channel on Monday. “That’s our fundamental policy position in combating TikTok and Wechat, and there will be other companies because China …… is basically going around the world trying to get technology and influence.”
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