TikTok granted 15-day extension to reach deal with US buyers

WASHINGTON -- Popular video-sharing app TikTok was granted by the US government a 15-day extension to reach a deal with US buyers, a federal court filing showed Friday.

This means the deadline for ByteDance, TikTok's Chinese parent company, to reach a deal with Oracle and Walmart has been extended from Nov 12 to Nov. 27, according to the US District Court for the District of Columbia.

Treasury Spokesperson Monica Crowley said in a statement that this extension will give the parties and the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) additional time to resolve this case in a manner that complies with the president's order.

On Aug 6, US President Donald Trump issued an executive order banning US transactions with TikTok and ByteDance after 45 days, citing national security concerns.

On Aug 14, Trump signed another executive order that forces ByteDance to sell or spin off its US TikTok business within 90 days, setting the deadline of Nov 12, Thursday.

"There is absolutely no evidence that TikTok poses a threat to US national security," Gary Hufbauer, a former US Treasury official and nonresident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, told Xinhua earlier.

"The claim is based on speculation that any mobile device with a Chinese app can be used to spy on Americans," Hufbauer said. "Paranoia pure and simple."

In September, Trump gave a preliminary approval for ByteDance to sell the app to US buyers, and then a potential deal among ByteDance, Oracle and Walmart emerged. However, the US administration offered no feedback in nearly two months.

TikTok said in a statement earlier that it had asked the US government for a 30-day extension because it was "facing continual new requests and no clarity on whether our proposed solutions would be accepted."

On Thursday, the US Commerce Department said it will not enforce an order to ban TikTok "pending further legal developments," citing a recent ruling by the US District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

Judge Wendy Beetlestone ruled on Oct 30 that she found the US government's "own descriptions of the national security threat posed by the TikTok app are phrased in the hypothetical," and therefore she could not find that "the risk presented by the government outweighs the public interest in enjoining" the ban.