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Trump dumps ban on TikTok, tells reporters aboard Air Force One

About damn time, if you ask me. How many lip sync videos is a person supposed to watch?

Asif Khan

July 31, 2020 8:00 PM

27

President Trump told reporters while flying on Air Force One that he plans to ban TikTok. This is an escalation of tensions between the United States and China as consulates in both countries have been shuttered in the past week. 

We are still in the air on Air Force One, landing shortly. Trump came back to speak with us off the record and agreed to move the portion about TikTok on the record

— Josh Lederman (@JoshNBCNews) August 1, 2020

Josh Lederman from NBC News tweeted out this news while aboard Air Force One. NY Times reporter Maggie Haberman tweeted out that Trump, "plans to terminate the social media platform Tik-Tok in the US using presidential authority." 

Bloomberg reports that the president told reporters on Friday night that  “As far as TikTok is concerned we’re banning them from the United States,” and when pressed about when it would happen he added: “Soon, immediately. I mean essentially immediately. I will sign the document tomorrow.”

As news of this ban hit Twitter, Charlie Gasparino over at Fox Business broke a story that Microsoft may be interested in acquiring TikTok. ByteDance, TikTok's parent company, is interested in dumping the app before the Trump administration shuts it down. Any deal between a Chinese and US company would draw a ton of scrutiny from regulators, but buying TikTok sounds like a Microsoft thing to do. 

It remains to be seen how much longer TikTokers will be able to post their dance and lip sync videos. Maybe this will be the Byte app's time to shine? Probably not. No one uses Byte.

Facebook will likely be a winner in all of this, as they reported extremely strong earnings results earlier this week and are poised to steal whatever features made TikTok the platform that was hip for the teens. Some of the biggest TikTokers are moving over to another app called Triller. Kids these days, am I right?

Keep it locked on Shacknews as this story is still developing. We will be sure to update this article whenever Trump tweets about this. His most recent tweet after this news has broken is about coronavirus cases being higher in the US because of testing. "It's Lamestream Media Gold!" said the president. 

Asif Khan

CEO/EIC/EIEIO

Asif Khan is the CEO, EIC, and majority shareholder of Shacknews. He began his career in video game journalism as a freelancer in 2001 for Tendobox.com. Asif is a CPA and was formerly an investment adviser representative. After much success in his own personal investments, he retired from his day job in financial services and is currently focused on new private investments. His favorite PC game of all time is Duke Nukem 3D, and he is an unapologetic fan of most things Nintendo. Asif first frequented the Shack when it was sCary's Shugashack to find all things Quake. When he is not immersed in investments or gaming he is a purveyor of fine electronic music. Asif also has an irrational love of Cleveland sports.