Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), chair of the House Judiciary Committee, said on Sunday that a change in the law would be necessary to keep TikTok online if ByteDance does not sell the video app to an entity not affiliated with the Chinese Communist Party.
“It seems to me, if you’re going to do something short of someone else purchasing TikTok and ByteDance no longer owning it, you’re going to have to have a change in the law. And if that’s what’s warranted, then I think the Congress will look at that with the leadership from President Trump,” Jordan said in an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” with Dana Bash.
“But we’re fortunate that President Trump is committed to working with us to find a solution,” he said. “So, I think everyone thinks this is going to get solved, because you have the guy coming in tomorrow into the White House, who knows how to get deals done, knows how to get things solved. So, I’m confident in that.”
Jordan said he’s comfortable with a 90-day extension, which is allowed as part of a bipartisan bill passed by Congress last April. The bill gave TikTok’s Chinese parent company, ByteDance, 270 days to divest from the app or face a ban from U.S. app stores.
“What we want is we don’t want China spying on Americans. We don’t want China influencing young people and the 170 million people who are involved in this app. So that’s what we want,” he said, when asked what he would like to see happen.
“How that gets resolved I guess we’re open, open to different scenarios,” he continued. “But right now, the law is the law, and of course, you get these companies abiding by the law of it. They don’t want the liability concern they would have if they had left this app to continue.”
