Is Donald Trump TikTok’s last hope in the US?

The popular video-sharing app appears to be on its last legs, set to be banned in the US on January 19 should its Chinese owner ByteDance not secure a non-Chinese buyer.

The company on Monday filed an emergency injunction urging the Supreme Court to block a ‘divest-or-ban’ bill signed into law in April. ByteDance has previously signaled that it does not intend to sell the platform.

Arguing that the original law violates the First Amendment free speech rights of the US’s 170 million TikTok users, the company is urging the Supreme Court justices to intervene after a lower federal court last week rejected TikTok’s appeal.

“Congress has enacted a massive and unprecedented speech restriction,” lawyers for TikTok wrote in the emergency application. “TikTok is an online platform that is one of the Nation’s most popular and important venues for communication.”

In the new filing, TikTok and ByteDance also aimed to delegitimize concerns from lawmakers that the app poses potential national security threats.

The ‘divest-or-ban’ bill, formally the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, is backed by broad bipartisan support, with lawmakers citing national security and consumer data privacy concerns related to ByteDance’s potential ties with the Chinese government. At this point, no substantial evidence has been presented to indicate that China has used TikTok to exploit US users, access US users’ personal data, disseminate propaganda or otherwise meddle in issues of national security.

Trump’s take on TikTok

With no confirmed buyer, the nationwide ban of the popular video app is set to come into effect just one day before Trump’s slated inauguration on January 20.

Should the Supreme Court decide not to step in, President Biden will be free to authorize a nationwide TikTok ban at that point. He may also issue a one-time extension of the deadline.

An extension could buy ByteDance some much-needed time to explore possible buyers, although the company does not wish to divest TikTok. And in order to approve a sale of the app to a non-Chinese buyer, the Chinese government would likely step in to bar TikTok’s powerful algorithm from being included in the sale – which would greatly diminish the platform’s value.

In contrast to Biden, Trump has waxed and waned on the topic. While he signaled support for banning TikTok during his first term in office, the president-elect has since changed his tune – a fact that some attribute to his coziness with campaign donors like Larry Ellison and Jeffrey Yass, who have deep investments in TikTok. He previously promised to “save” the app.

However, in an interview earlier this month on NBC’s Meet the Press, Trump was less convicted when pressed on the issue. When asked explicitly whether he intends to protect TikTok’s ability to operate in the US, he said, “I’m going to try and make it so that other companies don’t become an even bigger monopoly.”

Now, with a last-ditch emergency ask to the conservative-dominated Supreme Court and a meeting between Trump and TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew, it’s looking as though Trump could be the company’s last hope for survival in the US.

In the view of some experts, it’s far from a surefire bet for the company. “Trump may have a ‘warm spot’ for TikTok, but relying on the president-elect to save the app is a shaky strategy,” says Jasmine Enberg, vice-president and principal analyst at eMarketer specializing in social media. “His policy positions are hard to decipher and he’s already flip-flopped on his stance toward TikTok.”

Nonetheless, with its initial appeal rejected, TikTok’s “best shot” at this point, Enberg says, would be to ink a deal with Trump.

It’s worth noting that leaders of other social media platforms, including X and Meta, have warmed to the president-elect in recent months – a fact that could potentially influence Trump’s view of the video-sharing app. X’s mercurial billionaire owner Elon Musk has become not only a vocal supporter but something of a confidant to the incoming president, and Trump has appointed Musk to head a new agency focused on cutting bureaucratic fat in the federal government. Meanwhile, Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg earlier this month donated $1m to Trump’s inaugural fund, signaling a willingness to work with the incoming president.

Despite these facts, social media experts by and large expect that Trump will make the most of the moment.

“Trump is an opportunist – I think everyone would agree with that,” says Lou Paskalis, a media industry veteran and the founder and CEO of AJL Advisory. “I don’t think he gives a shit whether TikTok survives in the United States or doesn’t. He’s just like, ‘How can I benefit from your dilemma?’ He’s meeting with TikTok to see what's in it for him. Would they buy [Trump’s platform] Truth Social at an inflated price to give him an exit where he can cash in on that? [That] would be a rounding error financially for them, but a very high-value deal for him. What other models are there on the platform? Would they help him build an audience there so that he can activate whatever he might do in his next four years in office? … There are a lot of things that TikTok could offer the [incoming] president, either overtly or, more likely, covertly, that would be compelling.”

One clear benefit to cutting a deal with TikTok would be currying favor with the app’s millions of US users – many of whom are young and politically engaged – as well as the 7m organizations that use the app for business in the US.

This possibility alone is enough to compel Trump, suggests Mike Allton, a social media expert and head of strategic partnerships at social media management platform Agorapulse. In his words: “Trump will make every effort to arrange for a deal that will be seen as ‘saving’ TikTok, which could put him at odds with lawmakers and their constituents who felt threatened by Chinese ownership, but dramatically increase his favor with 170 million US TikTok users, and the businesses driving $16bn in ads and shopping revenue on the platform.”

The most obvious first step might be negotiating concessions from ByteDance, Allton says, which could mitigate some of lawmakers’ worries and potentially lead to a reversal of the ‘divest-or-ban’ law. For example, ByteDance could agree to store its data, in its entirety, on American soil – which would represent an expansion of an existing agreement to house all US user data in US databases in partnership with Oracle.

Of course, securing terms that appeal to lawmakers on both sides of the aisle will be easier said than done. Allton believes that a bipartisan decision to overturn the law is “highly unlikely,” even if Trump is able to win important concessions from ByteDance.

In this case, Trump’s next best options to safeguard the app’s future in the US might include relying on the Supreme Court to hear the case and rule in favor of TikTok, or to command the Justice Department not to enforce the ban.

Will the Supreme Court pick up the case?

It’s difficult to predict whether or not the Supreme Court will choose to hear the case, but its wide-ranging implications – spanning national security, data privacy, children’s safety, free speech and commerce – suggest that the Court could take interest in the decision.

In Paskalis’s view, TikTok’s reach and influence alone should entice the Court. In his view, “This affects too many Americans to abdicate their responsibility to either endorse or overturn [the law].”

If the Supreme Court chooses to pick up the case, it may issue a narrow ruling focused on just one legal argument, so as to avoid establishing precedents on tech or free expression that are too broad or ambiguous.

Brands wait as the water rises

While everyday users are taking to TikTok and other social platforms to express their concerns about the impending ban, with some creators bemoaning the financial losses they could incur as a result of lost revenues, brands who use TikTok will also be weighing their options.

Right now, experts generally agree that these organizations will be hedging their bets, though those with significant business tied to the app’s social commerce platform, TikTok Shop, may be more concerned than others.

Amy Luca, executive vice-president and global head of social at Monks, an S4 Capital-owned global ad agency, says that “brands are cautious but not panicking.”

For now, Luca says, “many are taking a ‘wait and see’ approach while continuing to leverage the platform’s massive reach,” and diversifying their investments across other social platforms like Instagram and YouTube, where rival short-form video offerings promise audiences and engagement.

It’s a view shared by Emarketer’s Enberg. She points out that even if a ban takes effect legally on January 19, the technical challenge of forcing app stores to stop carrying the platform and wiping it from devices will mean that “brands will mostly stick around as long as there are users to reach.”

And although brands are likely strategizing where to reallocate budgets should TikTok be made obsolete in the US market, at this point in the year, many will have already finalized first-quarter budgets for 2025. Rearranging agreed-upon investments will take some thoughtful maneuvering.

All the more reason why brands aren’t jumping ship quite yet.

“[Brands are] in a stateroom on one of the upper decks of the Titanic,” AJL Advisory’s Paskalis jokes. “The water hasn’t reached the door yet, so they’re still riding that platform – for good or for bad – into their future. It performs well. It drives their business. They figured out how to market on it, and they will move the budget at the very last possible minute in most cases.”

Of course, the ship may yet be saved.

“Ultimately,” Luca predicts, “a deal is the most likely outcome, allowing TikTok to continue operating under stricter regulations.”