U.S. Develops Plan for TikTok Agreement with China

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Monday that Washington and Beijing had struck a “framework for a TikTok deal,” days before another deadline that could have banned the popular social media app in the United States.

Bessent offered few details about the agreement. On a key sticking point about who would control TikTok’s algorithm, which dictates what users see on the app, he said: “We’re not going to talk about the commercial teams of the deal. It’s between two private parties, but the commercial terms have been agreed upon.”

He did not indicate which parties he was referring to.

“We were very focused on TikTok and making sure that it was a deal that is fair for the Chinese and completely respects U.S. national security concerns, and that’s the deal we reached,” Bessent said. He added that the U.S. wanted to “ensure that the Chinese have a fair investment environment in the United States, but always that U.S. national security comes first.”

Bessent spoke from Madrid, where he was meeting with a Chinese delegation to discuss ongoing trade tensions between the two superpowers. Just prior to his remarks, China announced it had found computer chip giant Nvidia in violation of its anti-trust laws over a 2020 deal.

Bessent’s statement came shortly after President Donald Trump posted on Truth Social that an agreement had been reached over a “company that young people in our Country very much wanted to save.”

Trump added that he would be speaking to Chinese President Xi Jinping on Friday.

The White House and TikTok did not respond to requests for comment.

TikTok has remained in legal limbo over a U.S. law that threatened to ban it unless it was sold to a non-Chinese buyer. It has continued to operate despite a 2024 law subsequently upheld by the Supreme Court that forced the app’s Chinese owner, ByteDance, to sell the social media platform to a U.S.-based company or face steep penalties for continuing to operate in the U.S. The law had bipartisan support in Congress when it passed due to concerns about privacy and national security for the app’s more than 170 million U.S.-based users.

The app was briefly shuttered in the U.S. just days before Trump’s inauguration — but the president promised not to impose penalties on TikTok after he was sworn in, while ByteDance worked to find a U.S.-based buyer.

Upon coming into office, he made that promise official with an executive order that he has since extended several times, most recently in June. The most recent extension is slated to expire Wednesday.

As the extensions have piled up, so have potential U.S.-based bidders for the app. They included, at various points, venture capital group Andreessen Horowitz, Amazon, asset management firm Blackstone and tech giant Oracle, whose co-founder, Larry Ellison, is a close Trump ally.

One of TikTok’s current U.S. investors, Jeffrey Yass, spent millions in 2024 on lobbying to protect the app from being shut down. At 7%, Yass’s share of TikTok was worth as much as $21 billion last year.

In July, NBC News reported Yass had donated $16 million to Trump’s duper PAC, sending MAGA Inc. $1 million days before Trump’s inauguration and another $15 million in early March.

Trump moved to ban TikTok in the U.S. during his first term, but has spoken about it favorably in his second term, crediting the platform with helping him win over key groups of young voters in the 2024 presidential election.

On Friday, during an interview on Fox News’ “Fox and Friends,” the president spoke about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk at an event Wednesday.

“A Republican never wins youth, but I won youth. I will tell you, TikTok helped me, but [Kirk] helped me with TikTok, but he helped me with youth,” Trump said.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick last week also spoke about the possible ban of the platform, highlighting the president’s positive feelings toward the platform while also weighing his concerns.

“The president likes TikTok. You know, he did well communicating with young people through TikTok. So he’s partial to it,” Lutnick told CNBC.

“But unless it’s owned by Americans, and the algorithm is controlled by Americans — because, you know, eventually that app in your phone, everything with China has a call daddy in it,” Lutnick said. “So the president knows, if we’re going to have TikTok here, that’s got to go.”

He added, “If the president can get that, he’s going to keep TikTok. If you can’t, it’s going to go dark.”