Oct. 26 (UPI) — President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping could “consummate” the TikTok deal announced last month this week, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said.
“We reached a final deal on TikTok. We reached one in Madrid, and I believe that as of today, all the details are ironed out, and that will be for the two leaders to consummate that transaction on Thursday in Korea,” Bessent said in an interview Sunday morning on “Face the Nation.”
Trump had signed an executive order in late September to complete a deal estimated at $14 billion that would create a U.S. entity to control TikTok, with American investors owning 80% of the company and its parent company ByteDance maintaining less than 20%.
It would satisfy an April 2024 law passed by Congress in the Biden administration requiring ByteDance to divest from the company or the platform would be banned for some 170 million U.S. users.
The president said at the time that the deal was approved by Xi in a phone conversation.
Bessent did not provide new details of the deal in the interview Sunday.
“My remit was to get the Chinese to agree to approve the transaction, and I believe we successfully accomplished that over the past two days,” Bessent said.
The White House said at the time the executive order was signed that the federal government would not play a role in selecting members for TikTok’s board. And when asked if the platform would begin to favor “MAGA” content, Trump responded it will be fair.
“If I could make it 100% MAGA I would but it’s not going to work out that way unfortunately,” Trump said. “Everyone is going to be treated fairly. Every group, every philosophy will be treated fairly.”
A number of academic studies have shown that TikTok already “tends to lean toward right-wing content, with right-wing praise being a significant predictor of user engagement.”
