On Friday, President Donald Trump announced a 75-day extension of the deadline for TikTok’s forced divestment or ban, throwing a lifeline to the app just hours before it was set to go dark in the United States.
The decision follows the unraveling of a planned deal that would have shifted TikTok’s U.S. operations into American hands — a breakdown many are blaming on Trump’s sudden imposition of a 34% tariff on Chinese goods, including digital services.
But while the White House has attributed the missed April 5 deadline to China’s abrupt withdrawal from the deal talks in protest of the tariffs, others close to the negotiations say the entire schedule was overly ambitious to begin with. Even without the trade shock, few believed that any of the potential American investors were close enough to finalize a takeover by the deadline, raising questions about whether the delay was always inevitable.
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In a post on Truth Social, Trump said his administration had been “working very hard” to secure a deal to “SAVE TIKTOK” and emphasized that “tremendous progress” had been made. Still, he conceded that more time was needed to finalize all necessary approvals. A source familiar with the matter confirmed that Trump signed an executive order formalizing the delay.
The ban had been scheduled to take effect on Saturday. It stemmed from a law passed during the Biden administration, which required TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to divest the app or face an outright ban in the U.S. over national security concerns. The law was to be enforced beginning in January, but Trump delayed implementation when he took office, first by 75 days, and now by an additional 75, while pursuing a deal that would keep the app available to its 170 million U.S. users under new ownership.
According to a source familiar with the negotiations, a framework agreement had been reached earlier this week. The deal would have transferred ownership of TikTok’s U.S. operations to a new entity backed by American private equity firms, venture capital groups, and tech companies. ByteDance was expected to retain a minority stake, capped at 20%, in compliance with the divestment law. The arrangement would also prohibit TikTok’s U.S. entity from sharing data or algorithm development with ByteDance.
However, after Trump unveiled the sweeping tariff hike on China, raising import duties to 34%, Beijing balked. ByteDance representatives informed the White House on Thursday that China would no longer approve the deal under the current conditions. That left the administration scrambling to reassess its options.
While the collapse is being pinned largely on the tariff move, insiders involved in the deal say the timeline was already under severe strain. Multiple investors had expressed interest in acquiring TikTok’s U.S. assets, but none had reached the final stages of due diligence or secured the financing needed to close such a large and complex deal. Some had barely progressed beyond exploratory talks, sources said, and several were waiting for clearer regulatory guidance, particularly regarding Chinese law governing the export of tech-related intellectual property.
In Washington, the political calculus continues to shift. Although Trump and Vice President JD Vance, who is overseeing the TikTok deal, were both confident earlier this week that a deal would be in place by April 5, the latest setback has left the White House in a holding pattern.
“We hope to continue working in Good Faith with China, who I understand are not very happy about our Reciprocal Tariffs,” Trump said in his post, adding, “We do not want TikTok to ‘go dark.’”
“We look forward to working with TikTok and China to close the Deal,” he said.
With the Chinese government now insisting that no deal will move forward without renewed negotiations on the tariffs, the administration had little choice but to delay enforcement again.
TikTok, for its part, remained silent in the hours after the announcement. ByteDance issued a brief statement acknowledging that it was in talks with the U.S. government but stressed that “key matters remain unresolved” and that any agreement would require Beijing’s approval. “An agreement has not been executed,” a spokesperson said, noting that everything is still subject to Chinese law.
In the days leading up to the deadline, TikTok CEO Shou Chew attended Trump’s inauguration ceremony, seated alongside cabinet officials and major tech CEOs — an appearance many interpreted as a signal of how seriously the company was treating the negotiations.
The app also briefly went offline in the U.S. a day before Inauguration Day, displaying a thank-you message when it came back online that read: “We will work with President Trump on a long-term solution that keeps TikTok in the United States.”
Still, the extended limbo continues to provoke concern on Capitol Hill. While Congress overwhelmingly backed the TikTok law last year, citing fears over data privacy, surveillance, and Chinese influence, the latest delay pushes the enforcement window far beyond what lawmakers originally envisioned. The law allows for only one 90-day extension, which can be granted if the president certifies to Congress that “significant progress” is being made toward a sale.
Some lawmakers and legal scholars quoted by CNN argue that Trump is testing the limits of that provision. “The first extension was already shaky, and this second one just compounds the legal and constitutional issues,” said Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond. “If Congress doesn’t push back, then what was the point of passing the law in the first place?”
Jeremy Goldman, principal analyst at Emarketer, said Trump’s delay follows a familiar playbook: stall the process, increase leverage, and use the ongoing uncertainty as a geopolitical bargaining chip.
“Drag out the clock, extract leverage, keep the drama simmering, and above all, make sure TikTok stays just visible enough to keep the dealmaking sharks circling,” Goldman said in a note Friday. “As long as TikTok is in limbo, Trump can keep using it as a pressure point in his broader trade war strategy with China.”
