New York (CNN) — Round 12 hours after shutting itself down in the US, TikTok is again for a lot of customers virtually prefer it by no means left, attributing its return to a transfer by President-elect Donald Trump to avoid wasting the app.
TikTok welcomed customers again with a notification that mentioned: “Thanks on your endurance and assist. Because of President Trump’s efforts, TikTok is again within the U.S.!”
The whiplash transfer to carry the app again comes after TikTok grew to become unusable for Individuals late Saturday evening. Customers who tried to open the app at the moment have been met with a message saying it was offline and asking customers to “keep tuned.”
“A legislation banning TikTok has been enacted within the U.S. Sadly, which means you may’t use TikTok for now,” TikTok’s message learn partly. The app was additionally unavailable on the Apple and Google Play shops, together with Lemon8 and CapCut, that are additionally owned by TikTok’s China-based mother or father firm, ByteDance.
Early on Sunday, Trump mentioned he would difficulty an govt order following his inauguration on Monday to delay enforcement of the divest-or-ban legislation. And inside hours, entry to TikTok’s app and webpage started to return for US customers.
TikTok’s restoration might be welcome information for the app’s 170 million American customers, a lot of whom use the app for hours daily to seek out information, leisure and group and, in some circumstances, to make a dwelling, after weeks of uncertainty.
And it signaled that Trump could also be poised to attain a significant political victory by claiming duty for bringing again the favored platform. In an announcement noon Sunday, TikTok mentioned Trump’s promise to avoid wasting the app allowed it to revive US customers’ entry even earlier than his anticipated govt order is signed.
“In settlement with our service suppliers, TikTok is within the strategy of restoring service. We thank President Trump for offering the required readability and assurance to our service suppliers that they may face no penalties offering TikTok to over 170 million Individuals and permitting over 7 million small companies to thrive,” the corporate mentioned in an announcement. “We’ll work with President Trump on a long-term answer that retains TikTok in the US.”
TikTok CEO Shou Chew is predicted to attend Trump’s “Make America Nice Once more Victory Rally” in Washington, DC, Sunday evening, earlier than being seated prominently on the incoming president’s inauguration Monday.
However whereas TikTok’s shutdown lasted just some hours, securing the app’s long-term future in the US is more likely to be extra sophisticated.
The trail to securing TikTok’s future
Trump mentioned Sunday in a Reality Social submit that he plans to difficulty an govt order following his inauguration on Monday to “prolong the time period earlier than the legislation’s prohibitions take impact, in order that we are able to make a deal to guard our nationwide safety.”
He urged TikTok’s companions to permit the app to be restored, saying “the order may also affirm that there might be no legal responsibility for any firm that helped maintain TikTok from going darkish earlier than my order.”
“Individuals should see our thrilling Inauguration on Monday, in addition to different occasions and conversations,” Trump mentioned.
Trump had mentioned he was contemplating a 90-day extension within the ban to offer him time to work out a deal to promote the app to a non-Chinese language proprietor. In his submit, Trump mentioned he would search a 50-50 three way partnership between TikTok’s present mother or father firm, China-based ByteDance, and a brand new, American proprietor.
Such an announcement may function a type of instant political victory for Trump with America’s youth. Though Trump supported a TikTok ban in his first time period as president, he has lately mentioned he needs to maintain the app alive — posting on Reality Social Sunday morning: “SAVE TIKTOK!” Final month, he requested the Supreme Courtroom to remain the legislation so his incoming administration may work out a deal to maintain TikTok obtainable to Individuals. The Supreme Courtroom upheld the legislation on Friday.
TikTok appealed to Trump in its pop-up message on the app beginning late Saturday evening notifying customers that the app was unavailable in the US.
“We’re lucky that President Trump has indicated that he’ll work with us on an answer to reinstate TikTok as soon as he takes workplace,” the corporate posted in its pop-up message. “Please keep tuned!”
And Chew additionally lauded Trump in a video responding to the corporate’s Supreme Courtroom loss on Friday, saying, “we’re grateful and happy to have the assist of a president who really understands our platform, one who has used TikTok to specific his personal ideas and views, connecting with the world and producing greater than 60 billion views of his content material within the course of.”
Trump attributed his election victory partly to TikTok at a press convention at Mar-a-Lago in December.
“I’ve a heat spot in my coronary heart for TikTok,” Trump mentioned, then claiming to have gained the youth vote by a big margin. “And there are people who say that TikTok had one thing to do with it.”
The legislation banning TikTok handed with sturdy bipartisan assist in Congress, citing nationwide safety issues. Though a Pew Analysis Middle Survey in 2023 discovered about half of Individuals supported the ban, it has constantly confirmed unpopular with youthful generations.
Together with his govt order, Trump is predicted to delay enforcement of the ban to offer TikTok mother or father firm ByteDance extra time to seek out an American proprietor. Trump’s Sunday message might have been sufficient to reassure TikTok’s know-how companions, together with Oracle, which hosts TikTok’s content material in the US, and Apple and Google, which host the app on their app shops, to proceed supporting the app. Below the legislation, these firms may face penalties of as much as $5,000 per one that has entry to TikTok, whether it is enforced.
Not a everlasting answer
However the govt order may face challenges, together with from members of Trump’s personal occasion, who say they oppose any extension of the ban.
“We commend Amazon, Apple, Google and Microsoft for following the legislation and halting operations with ByteDance and TikTok, and we encourage different firms to do the identical,” Republican Senators Tom Cotton, of Arkansas, and Pete Ricketts, of Nebraska, wrote in a joint assertion Sunday. “The legislation, in any case, dangers ruinous chapter for any firm who violates it. Now that the legislation has taken impact, there’s no authorized foundation for any type of ‘extension’ of its efficient date.”
Cotton and Ricketts mentioned TikTok ought to solely come again on-line by “severing all ties between TikTok and Communist China. Solely then will Individuals be protected against the grave menace posed to their privateness and safety by a communist-controlled TikTok.”
The app’s temporary blackout marked the belief of a yearslong effort to dam US entry to TikTok over nationwide safety issues associated to its China-based proprietor ByteDance. Outgoing President Joe Biden signed a legislation final April that gave ByteDance 270 days to promote TikTok to an proprietor from the US or certainly one of its allies or face a ban.
So even when Trump pledges to reverse the ban, he can’t merely undo a legislation handed by Congress and signed by a president with an govt order.
That’s why TikTok shut down within the first place. Regardless of the Biden administration all however saying they might defer enforcement to the incoming Trump administration, an individual near TikTok says “a number of essential service suppliers” indicated to TikTok that they have been involved that the ban may be enforced beginning Sunday.
For instance, Apple launched an announcement Sunday that cited the ban as its motive for eradicating TikTok from its app retailer. It famous the app will stay obtainable for purchasers who already downloaded it, however it gained’t be capable of be redownloaded if deleted.
“Apple is obligated to observe the legal guidelines within the jurisdictions the place it operates,” the corporate mentioned in its assertion. “Pursuant to the Defending Individuals from Overseas Adversary Managed Functions Act, apps developed by ByteDance Ltd. and its subsidiaries — together with TikTok, CapCut, Lemon8, and others — will now not be obtainable for obtain or updates on the App Retailer for customers in the US beginning January 19, 2025.”
The long-term repair
The one really everlasting options to maintain TikTok on-line seem like: 1) cross a brand new legislation reversing the previous one — no simple process, contemplating that the present invoice had such broad bipartisan assist in Congress — or 2) pressure a sale to an appropriate purchaser.
Two potential purchasers — a bunch led by billionaire Frank McCourt and “Shark Tank’s” Kevin O’Leary, in addition to AI search engine PerplexityAI — have submitted formal bids for the app and others have reportedly proven curiosity in TikTok.
ByteDance, nonetheless, has lengthy been adamant that it has no intention of promoting. TikTok’s near-magical algorithm, conserving customers hooked on the app, is its secret energy, and placing a price ticket on such a beneficial commodity, envied by each different social media app, is tough.
McCourt’s purchaser group has mentioned it might purchase TikTok’s US property with out the algorithm and rebuild the app, however tech giants like Meta and YouTube have for years labored to copy TikTok’s standard algorithm with out fairly succeeding. O’Leary informed CNN he met with Trump at Mar-a-Lago earlier this month to debate the outlook for the app.
Spinning off an American-only model of TikTok may additionally imply the remainder of the world has to obtain a brand new app to entry US customers’ content material. But Bloomberg and the Wall Road Journal reported final week that China is weighing a sale — to Elon Musk.
Musk might have the sources to purchase the app, and he’s a significant Trump supporter and about to take a quasi-role in his authorities. However it’s unclear that he would need to, and he has not publicly commented immediately on the acquisition experiences.
On Sunday, Musk posted on X that he opposes the TikTok ban “as a result of it goes towards freedom of speech.”
“That mentioned, the present state of affairs the place TikTok is allowed to function in America, however X is just not allowed to function in China is unbalanced. One thing wants to vary,” Musk mentioned.
If ByteDance chooses to interact, Trump may maybe argue that vital progress has been made on a deal — a authorized threshold that will legally allow Trump to reverse the ban to permit the sale course of to begin.
In his Reality Social submit Sunday, Trump mentioned the US ought to have “a 50% possession place in a three way partnership.”
“By doing this, we save TikTok, maintain it in good fingers and permit it to say (sic) up,” he mentioned. “Due to this fact, my preliminary thought is a three way partnership between the present homeowners and/or new homeowners whereby the U.S. will get a 50% possession in a three way partnership arrange between the U.S. and whichever buy we so select.”
That’s solely a short lived measure, although, because the sale would in the end must undergo. Till then, TikTok’s future will stay very a lot doubtful.
A ‘surreal’ shutdown
Many TikTok customers had held onto hope that the shutdown could be short-lived.
Nonetheless, the Saturday evening shutdown was a tragic loss for some customers — a reminder of the app’s cultural affect. Many customers joined the app in early 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic was in any other case isolating them from group and different artistic shops.
“I’m so unhappy for therefore many individuals. I used to be shocked. I feel I used to be most likely in denial a little bit bit that it might truly simply go darkish,” influencer Shannon Lange informed CNN early Sunday, earlier than entry to the app was restored.
Influencer Alix Earle, who had almost 8 million TikTok followers, posted a tearful video on the platform forward of the shutdown saying, “I really feel like I’m going by means of heartbreak. This platform is greater than an app or a job to me. I’ve so many recollections on right here. I’ve posted daily for the previous 6 years of my life.”
Julie Turkel, a TikTok creator who mentioned she was scrolling the app when it stopped working Saturday evening, referred to as the shutdown “surreal.”
“It was simply surreal, it did have a really eerie feeling,” Turkel informed CNN. She added that though she had anticipated the shutdown after TikTok’s warnings final week, “seeing it truly go down is totally different.”
Turkel informed CNN early Sunday she was taking a digital “detox,” opting to not spend time on Instagram or different short-form video platforms, whereas TikTok was down. The break didn’t final lengthy.
When the app returned on Sunday, Lange posted a video smiling and dancing, with overlaid textual content that learn: “Longest 13 hours of my life and I used to be sleeping for 9 of them.”
– CNN’s Brian Stelter contributed to this report.
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