TikTok’s fate in the US has been up in the air since 2020, when President Donald Trump decided to ban the popular video app over national security concerns.
That set off a four-year back-and-forth between the app’s Chinese owners and the U.S. government, with a possible ban set to take effect a day before Trump’s inauguration in January.
One problem: Trump recently changed his mind, joining TikTok in June and posting on social media: “Those who want to save TikTok in America, vote for Trump.”
“We’re not doing anything with TikTok,” he said.
That has given some makers hope.
“The fact that Trump has done a complete 180 and wants to wait and reassess how everything is going with TikTok — I think we’ll be fine,” said creator Kat Vera, 34, who posts fitness and automotive content and has 457,000 followers has. on TikTok.
But there are factors that complicate the app’s position. Several legal experts and tech industry observers said the path forward for TikTok remains precarious.
“It’s just a huge mess, and it’s not clear,” said Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond.
In April, Biden signed a law passed by Congress that requires TikTok’s Chinese parent company ByteDance to divest its ownership of TikTok by Jan. 19 or risk a ban in the U.S. over security concerns over the app’s ties to China .
Biden has the option to extend ByteDance’s deadline, but some legal experts say that is unlikely. Changing the law would require congressional approval, they said. Instead, some believe the case could be settled in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.
TikTok and ByteDance sued the U.S. government in May, claiming that banning the app would violate the First Amendment right to freedom of expression and that the new law “does not support the idea” that Chinese ownership of TikTok poses national security risks.
Experts said they expect the court to make a decision next month. If the court rules in favor of TikTok and ByteDance, the law will be declared unconstitutional and the government is unlikely to appeal under the new Trump administration.
But if the court rules against the app and the tech giant, they could appeal to the Supreme Court and ask for the new law to be paused, said Michael Stovsky, a partner at the Benesch law firm in Cleveland.
“They’ll probably ask the court to say, ‘Look, don’t enforce the law. Do not demand that the company withdraw before the Supreme Court hears the case,” Stovsky said.
Representatives for TikTok and the Trump administration did not respond to requests for comment.
In a lawsuit, TikTok and ByteDance said they have tried to work with the U.S. government’s Committee on Foreign Investment since 2019 to address security concerns.
Under the terms of a deal laid out in a 90-page draft agreement, data collected on TikTok users in the US was to be processed by US tech giant Oracle. The proposed agreement also called for Oracle to inspect TikTok’s programming code for vulnerabilities and to subject the platform’s content to independent oversight.
If TikTok did not comply, the draft agreement called for financial sanctions and also included the option to suspend TikTok’s operations in the US. TikTok and ByteDance said it is unclear why the commission ultimately concluded that the proposed agreement was insufficient.
Meanwhile, Trump has changed his tune on TikTok, at least in part for apparently personal reasons and his hostility toward the app’s rivals. Earlier this year, he called himself a “big star on TikTok.”
“Get rid of TikTok and Facebook and Zuckerschmuck will double their revenue,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in March, referring to Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook’s parent company Meta. “I don’t want Facebook, which cheated in the last election, to do better. They are a real enemy of the people!”
Republican leaders have accused the social media site of censoring conservative views, which Facebook refuted, saying it has guidelines that “do not allow the suppression of political perspectives.”
Trump, who has 14.6 million followers on TikTok, joined the popular video app months after meeting Jeff Yass, a ByteDance investor, major Republican Party donor and co-founder and managing partner of Susquehanna International Group, but Trump told CNBC this was not the case. discuss TikTok.
People who worked for Trump have also joined TikTok’s cause. Club for Growth, a conservative economic organization, has hired former Trump aide Kellyanne Conway to advocate for TikTok in Congress, according to Politico.
But the Trump administration will face differing positions within the Republican party on TikTok, with some favoring a hard line on China.
“I think it’s going to be a chip in a much bigger game with tariffs with China, security agreements and the like, and TikTok is going to be part of a bigger picture,” said Freddy Tran Nager, associate director of USC Annenberg’s Social Media Digital Masters Program.
TikTok has a significant presence in Culver City, employing about 440 people there, according to city estimates. The company, which has 170 million U.S. users, has been a key vehicle for promoting content by creators, small businesses, music artists and Hollywood studios.
Earlier this year, TikTok informed the state of California that it would lay off 58 employees in Culver City in July “due to restructuring.” Positions affected included senior business analysts and global product specialists.
Many creators have already diversified by publishing their content on other platforms, so they don’t have to rely solely on TikTok. Some say the money-making opportunities are better with competing services.
Theodora Moutinho, a fitness creator and actress from Glendale, said she has learned to always adapt in the fast-paced world of social media.
The 25-year-old became a creator in 2017 and today has 4.2 million followers on Instagram, 1.3 million on TikTok and 421,000 on Snapchat. These days, she’s putting more effort into her Snapchat and Instagram accounts, while keeping an eye on newer platforms like Bluesky.
“Since it was up in the air that they were going to take it off and they weren’t, I kind of stopped really focusing on it,” Moutinho said of TikTok. “Because why try to grow something if it could collapse?”
Times news researcher Scott Wilson contributed to this report.