It remains unclear whether TikTok will still be available in the United States on Sunday, with the company claiming that outgoing President Joe Biden’s administration must provide “definitive” assurances that it will not implement a ban.
On Friday, the Supreme Court upheld a law that would effectively ban TikTok in the US unless the app’s owner ByteDance sells it. With a sale unlikely to take place in the two days before the law takes effect (and ByteDance repeatedly insisting it won’t sell), it looked like TikTok would disappear from app stores on Sunday, January 19.
Reports have suggested that it may also stop working entirely as US companies will be barred from providing services that support the distribution, maintenance or updating of the app.
However, January 19 is also the day before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, and the incoming president had asked the Supreme Court to delay the ban so he could “negotiate a resolution to save the platform.”
While the court did not agree to a delay, the Biden administration also seemed inclined to leave TikTok’s fate in Trump’s hands. In a statement Friday, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden’s position has not changed — namely, that “TikTok should remain available to Americans, but only under American ownership or other ownership that addresses national security concerns identified by Congress.” However, given the timing, Jean-Pierre said “actions to enforce the law should simply be left to the next administration.”
Similarly, a Justice Department statement from Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco suggested that “the next phase of this effort — implementing and ensuring compliance with the law after it takes effect on January 19 — will be an ongoing process over time”.
However, TikTok responded with a statement of its own suggesting that this was not enough for the company and other service providers to continue offering the TikTok app. In TikTok’s view, Biden and the DOJ “failed to provide the necessary clarity and certainty to service providers that are integral to maintaining the availability of TikTok to over 170 million Americans.”
The company added, “If the Biden administration does not immediately issue a definitive statement to satisfy the most critical service providers by ensuring non-implementation, TikTok will unfortunately be forced to go dark on January 19.”
After TikTok’s comments, Jean-Pierre described the company’s statement as “a stunt” and said the administration sees “no reason for TikTok or other companies to take action in the coming days before the Trump administration takes office on Monday.” .
This post has been updated to reflect additional comments from the White House, as well as reports that TikTok may be shut down entirely in the US, not just removed from app stores.
