Trump approves executive order delaying TikTok ban
President Trump has signed an executive order giving TikTok a 75-day extension to comply with legislation that requires a sale or ban of the platform.
He says that during that time the US will not implement the law passed by Congress last year and signed by former President Joe Biden.
The order was one of the directives signed by Trump on Monday evening.
“Let me tell you. Every rich person has called me about TikTok,” he said, speaking to reporters in the Oval Office.
When asked by a reporter why he had a change of heart after trying to ban TikTok in 2020, Trump responded: “Because I had to use it.”
The Chinese-owned app stopped working for US users on Saturday evening after a law banning it on national security grounds was implemented.
It restarted services for its 170 million users in the US after Trump said he would issue an executive order to bail out the app if he takes office.
TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, had previously ignored a law that required it to sell its US operations to avoid the ban. The Supreme Court upheld this law on Friday and it came into force on Sunday.
Trump supported the ban on the platform during his first term in the White House.
TikTok Chief Executive Shou Zi Chew attended Trump’s inauguration on Monday along with other big technology bosses including Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos.
