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When you’re a U.S.-based TikTok consumer who was anxiously counting down the times till the social media app was banned on Dec. 16, 2025, then there’s excellent news. Christmas got here early — you can begin counting down the times till Jan. 23 as a substitute.
Dec. 16 was, in principle, the most recent deadline for TikTok, which is owned by Chinese language tech agency ByteDance, to wrap up a sale of its U.S. enterprise. That was purported to occur by regulation (the Defending People from Overseas Adversary Managed Functions Act of 2024, if you happen to’re feeling formal) on Inauguration Day, Jan. 20, 2025; the truth is, there was a short shutdown.
The deadline has been prolonged 4 occasions, through govt order, for the reason that Trump administration gained energy on that date. The primary delay took us to April 4, 2025. On that date, one other govt order gave ByteDance till June 19, 2025 to promote. Then, guess what: a June 19 govt order pushed the deadline again till Dec. 16, 2025.
Within the meantime, we appear to be no nearer to a TikTok sale. By a number of accounts, negotiations have develop into slowed down, partially as a result of the Chinese language authorities takes a dim view of the U.S. strong-arming certainly one of its corporations and views the deal as leverage. To not point out {that a} constantly-extended deadline is not an actual deadline in any respect.
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Trump, who has repeatedly drawn consideration to his personal following on TikTok, could seem like he is tactically delaying the ban. However he is additionally eager to take credit score for the potential for a sale, and it does not precisely take a global diplomacy professional to see weaknesses on this recreation of hardball. You simply should know certainly one of 2025’s hottest political truisms: TACO.
Certainly, on Sept. 25, Trump issued one other govt order directing the U.S. Legal professional Basic to take “no motion for noncompliance” in opposition to TikTok for “120 days from the date of this order” — which brings us to Jan. 23, 2026. Why? As a result of, Trump wrote, “a plan has been offered to me to endure a certified divestiture of TikTok’s United States operations.”
That plan was stated to contain a $14 billion sale of the U.S. arm of TikTok to a consortium together with Oracle, which is led by Trump backer Larry Ellison. However no additional particulars have materialized, and the Chinese language authorities insists the sale is not going forward — resulting in widespread confusion.
So will TikTok be formally banned within the U.S. on Jan. 23, 2026, 368 days after the unique ban was stated to go forward? Your guess is nearly as good as ours — however given the proof of the previous yr, it most likely would not be sensible to guess your life financial savings on it.
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