President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order putting a stamp of approval on the proposed deal to spin off an American version of TikTok, and granting an additional 120 days for the U.S. and China to formalize the terms.
The order marks a significant procedural step toward selling the company to a collection of wealthy American investors. Trump has said the deal will include Lachlan Murdoch, Oracle’s Larry Ellison and Dell’s Michael Dell.
Trump’s order certifies the pending agreement is a “qualified divestiture” — a legal standard that the app is no longer under the control of a foreign adversary, which would make TikTok legal again under the bipartisan law passed by Congress in 2024 and upheld unanimously by the Supreme Court.
Vice President JD Vance said the new U.S. entity will be valued around $14 billion, and the new American owners would control the algorithm at the heart of TikTok’s success.
“The U.S. company will have control over how the algorithm pushes content to users and that was a very important part of it,” Vance said. “We thought it was necessary for the national security level element of the law.
In the executive order, Trump outlined the “interagency process” through which the White House determined TikTok would meet the law’s national-security requirement, and said the new ownership deal “would protect the American people from the misuse of their data and the influence of a foreign adversary, while also allowing the millions of American viewers, creators, and businesses that rely on the TikTok application to continue using it.”
The Chinese government has been far less definitive in discussing the future of TikTok and the agreement with the Trump administration — and their signoff and regulatory approvals will be needed for it to formally go into effect.
Trump on Thursday said Beijing had agreed to the deal.
“He gave us the go ahead,” President Donald Trump said of his discussion with Chinese President Xi Jinping. “They’re on board.”
As outlined by the administration, the framework would see a new domestic U.S. TikTok venture that would then “operate, retrain and continuously monitor the U.S. algorithm to ensure content is free from improper manipulation or surveillance” that would then be audited by Oracle.
Asked if the U.S. government would get any sort of annual payment from the sale, Trump replied: “A lot of money in taxes.”
Despite the White House’s confidence, China has one of the most obdurate and politicized bureaucracies in the world, so could theoretically draw out the formal approvals for the arrangement as it seeks U.S. concessions on other live issues like Trump’s tariffs.
Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping talked about the TikTok deal framework in a call last Friday and are expected to meet next month at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in South Korea.
China hawks on Capitol Hill have vowed to scrutinize the U.S.-China framework to make sure it adheres to the intent of protecting national security in their bipartisan law, but have largely held off commenting until they see the text of the arrangement on paper.
Phelim Kine contributed to this report.
