On September 27 this year, Judge Nichols issued a temporary prohibition order against the US Department of Commerce. The order prohibits the department from banning the download of TikTok from Apple and Google App Stores. Yesterday, Washington District Judge, Carl Nichols, issued another injunction which stops the US Department of Commerce from imposing restrictions on TikTok. According to TikTok, the restriction will actually prevent its app from being used in the United States.
Just over a month ago, another judge in Pennsylvania, issued a temporary injunction to prevent the restrictions imposed by the US Department of Commerce on TikTok from taking effect on November 12. The US Department of Commerce’s order prohibits US companies from providing data storage, content delivery, and other technical transactions to TikTok’s US business. TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, claims that this actually prohibits the use of TikTok in the United States.
In addition, ByteDance has filed a complaint with the court, seeking to prevent the US government from forcing it to sell TikTok. The U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington has since asked ByteDance and the Trump administration to submit motions and other documents of the case before December 14 and 28, respectively.
Gizchina News of the week
The U.S. government postpones TikTok US asset sale deadline again
The U.S. government is still at loggerheads with TikTok regarding the sale of TikTok’s assets in the U.S. According to the latest report, the mandatory sale of TikTok US assets can not happen before the set deadline. To this end, the U.S. government has once again postponed the deadline date for the transaction.
In order to meet the security concerns of the U.S. government, TikTok is still negotiating the sale of its U.S. assets. The initial deadline for the conclusion of the deal is on Friday. However, since negotiations are still on, the government will have to extend the deadline again. This is not the first time that the government will be extending this deadline. In fact, it has extended the deadline several times in the past. A week ago, the US government extended the deadline for selling TikTok’s US assets to this Friday. Nevertheless, the final agreement to sell TikTok’s US assets still needs to be approved by Chinese regulators.
With the changing political situation in the U.S., the negotiations will take a different shape soon. In fact, TikTok might not like to reach an agreement right now. It may attempt to drag the deal and take its chances with the incoming government. However, the Biden-led administration may just be as tough as Trump’s when it comes to Chinese businesses.
