The White House announced that American companies will now take control of TikTok’s algorithm, while Americans will hold six of seven board seats for the app’s US business as part of a closely watched deal with China.
Press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the agreement could be signed “in the coming days,” though Beijing has yet to provide an official response.
For years, Washington has pressed to separate TikTok’s US operations from its Chinese parent company ByteDance, citing national security concerns. The company was told to sell its American arm or risk being shut down.
President Donald Trump has delayed implementing the ban four times since January, most recently extending the deadline until December.
Leavitt said that US data and privacy operations will be overseen by tech giant Oracle, chaired by billionaire Larry Ellison, a close Trump ally.
“The data and privacy will be led by one of America’s greatest tech companies, Oracle, and the algorithm will also be controlled by America as well,” she told Fox News.
“So all of those details have already been agreed upon. Now we just need this deal to be signed.”
Ellison’s son, David Ellison, recently purchased Paramount, the parent company of CBS News, further cementing the family’s influence across media and technology.
Trump said on Friday that he and Chinese President Xi Jinping had approved the deal in a phone call, though Beijing has not confirmed this.
On Truth Social, Trump described the conversation as “productive” and said he “appreciated” Xi’s approval of the plan, which would transfer TikTok’s US operations to a group of American investors.
China’s Commerce Ministry struck a more cautious tone in a statement on Saturday.
“China’s position on TikTok is clear: The Chinese government respects the wishes of the enterprise, and welcomes it to carry out commercial negotiations in accordance with market rules to reach a solution compliant with China’s laws and regulations, and strikes a balance of interests.”
State news agency Xinhua also left the outcome uncertain, quoting Xi as saying that Beijing “welcomes negotiations over TikTok.”
Control of TikTok’s algorithm remains one of the central sticking points in the negotiations. The system drives content to more than 170 million American users.
During a visit to the UK on Thursday, Trump sidestepped a question about whether an American buyer would need to create a new algorithm or continue using the existing one.
Although Trump initially called for a full ban during his first term, he embraced TikTok during the 2024 election campaign to reach younger voters.
Earlier this year, the Supreme Court upheld a law requiring ByteDance to divest from TikTok’s US operations or face a ban. The app briefly went offline in January before the order was delayed again.
The Justice Department has repeatedly warned that the platform’s access to US user data represents a national security risk of “immense depth and scale.”
