TikTok denies report China wants to sell app to Elon Musk

TikTok denied a report that China is potentially considering facilitating a sale of the app to tech billionaire Elon Musk to keep TikTok operational in America amid a looming ban from the US government.

Monday Bloomberg reported that “Chinese officials are evaluating a potential option involving Elon Musk’s takeover of TikTok’s US operations” if a US law goes into effect that would require parent company ByteDance to divest its TikTok stake or effectively ban the app in the US. The Bloomberg report cited anonymous sources.

“We cannot be expected to comment on pure fiction,” a TikTok representative said in response Black‘s request for comment.

Musk has not commented on Bloomberg’s TikTok report. Musk, who is CEO of Tesla and SpaceX and is the world’s richest person, bought Twitter in 2022 in a $44 billion deal and subsequently renamed it X. Under “a scenario” that has been discussed by the Chinese government, X “take control of TikTok US and run the companies together,” according to the Bloomberg report. The news outlet noted that it is “unclear whether Musk, TikTok and ByteDance have held any talks about the terms of any potential deal.”

TikTok is at risk of being banned in the US under a law set to take effect on January 19, unless the Supreme Court issues a ruling preventing it from taking effect.

On Friday, January 10, the Supreme Court heard arguments in TikTok’s emergency appeal seeking to block the law, with TikTok and ByteDance arguing that the law violates the First Amendment rights of its 170 million US users. But the judges appeared to lean toward being more receptive to the government’s position — that TikTok represents a national security threat because it falls under the jurisdiction of the Chinese Communist Party.

Beijing-based ByteDance has not indicated that it is exploring the sale of its approximately 40% stake in TikTok to an entity or investor group that would meet with US approval. Meanwhile, Chinese officials have previously suggested that if ByteDance tried to sell its stake in TikTok, such a move would be blocked because it would represent a technology export.

Congress passed divestment-or-ban legislation targeting TikTok last year with solid bipartisan support, and it was signed into law by President Biden. US lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have expressed deep concern about TikTok’s Chinese ownership, suggesting that the Chinese communist regime could use the app to spy on Americans or use it to spread pro-Chinese propaganda.

The law – the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act – prohibits Apple and Google’s app stores and web hosting services from hosting or distributing TikTok in the US unless ByteDance sells its ownership of the app to any party in a country not designated as a “foreign adversary” by USA.

President-elect Donald Trump has requested that the Supreme Court suspend the law from taking effect on January 19 to allow his administration to pursue a “negotiated resolution that could prevent a nationwide shutdown of TikTok and thereby preserve First Amendment rights for tens of millions of Americans while also addressing the government’s national security concerns.” During his first term, Trump tried unsuccessfully to force a TikTok sale to US-based parties, also citing national security fears.