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The U.S. and China have a reached a ‘framework’ deal for social media platform TikTok, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent mentioned Monday.
“It is between two personal events, however the business phrases have been agreed upon,” he mentioned from U.S.-China talks in Madrid.
Each President Donald Trump and Chinese language President Xi Jinping will meet Friday to debate the phrases. Trump additionally mentioned in a Reality Social submit Monday {that a} deal was reached “on a ‘sure’ firm that younger folks in our Nation very a lot needed to save lots of.”
Bessent additionally indicated that the framework may pivot to a U.S.-controlled possession.
The feedback got here in the course of the newest spherical of commerce discussions between the U.S. and China. Relations have soured between the 2 international locations in current months from Trump’s tariffs and different commerce restrictions.
On the identical time, the U.S. faces a Sept. 17 deadline to both divest TikTok’s U.S. enterprise or shut down the social media app within the nation.
Congress handed a regulation final yr prohibiting app retailer operators like Apple and Google from distributing TikTok within the U.S. resulting from its “overseas adversary-controlled software” standing.
However Trump postponed the shutdown in January, signing an government order in January that gave ByteDance 75 extra days to make a deal. Additional extensions got here by the use of government orders in April and in June.
Trump and administration officers have vocalized issues in regards to the platform and the administration’s intentions.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick mentioned in July that TikTok would shutter for People if China does not give the U.S. extra autonomy over the favored short-form video app.
Trump informed CNBC in an interview final yr that he believed the platform was a nationwide safety risk.
As for who controls the social media app, Trump informed Fox Information in June that he had a gaggle of “very rich folks” able to by the social media platform and will reveal their identities in two weeks. The reveal by no means got here.
He has beforehand mentioned he’d be open to Oracle Chairman Larry Ellison or Tesla CEO Elon Musk shopping for TikTok within the U.S. Synthetic intelligence startup Perplexity has submitted a bid for an acquisition, as has businessman Frank McCourt’s Challenge Liberty web advocacy group, CNBC reported in January.
