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The countdown is on before America’s TikTok ban goes into effect. A quick refresher: Back in April 2024, Biden signed a bipartisan bill into law requiring TikTok’s Chinese parent, ByteDance, to sell the app to a US company within 270 days or risk being removed from US app stores and any “internet hosting services” that support it. Government officials and members of Congress have been given some pretty alarming intelligence briefings about the company, which is challenging the law in front of the Supreme Court on Friday, January 10. The deadline for the sale is January 19, and if I may say, it feels like we’ve all lived 270 different lifetimes over the past nine months.

Shark Tank’s Kevin O’Leary is trying to swoop in and save the day. On Monday, he announced that he and former Los Angeles Dodgers owner Frank McCourt are close to finalizing a deal to buy TikTok from ByteDance and therefore prevent the ban from happening. He even went on Fox News to appeal to the president-elect to help him get it across the finish line in the upcoming months.

“Shark Tank” star Kevin O’Leary on Monday said he’s nearing a deal to purchase TikTok’s U.S. business in a move that would save the popular app from being banned from the States. TikTok is set to be banned from the U.S. on Jan. 19, unless the company’s parent company, Beijing-based Bytedance, can find a buyer for its American business.

O’Leary, while making an appearance on “The Story with Martha MacCallum” on Fox News, said he’ll need the assistance of president-elect Donald Trump to get the deal across the finish line.

“Trump will be who we have to work with to close the deal in the months ahead. So I wanted to let him know, as well as others in his cabinet, that we’re doing this, and we’re going to need their help.”

Earlier in the day, O’Leary posted on X that he was partnering with former Dodgers owner Frank McCourt on his bid for TikTok. A deal for TikTok’s American business will not be cheap. Wedbush Managing Director Dan Ives told TheWrap last month a deal for TikTok — which has 170 million monthly users in the U.S. — would cost a record-setting $300 billion.

The TikTok ban was initially floated during Trump’s first administration, before ultimately being passed by Congress and signed into law by President Joe Biden last April. The chief concern U.S. lawmakers have with TikTok is that it doubles as a spyware app for the Chinese government; TikTok, according to Chinese law, is required to share user data with China’s communist government, if it is asked to do so.

Most Americans do not seem to be too concerned with China’s government having easy access to their data, though. Only 32% of Americans are in favor of the U.S. government banning TikTok, according to a Pew Research Center survey in September.

Despite his initial support, Trump has since changed his tune on banning TikTok, saying last year that he would like to “save” the app. And in December, Trump reiterated he would like to keep TikTok in the U.S. He said he’d “take a look” at saving TikTok, noting he had a “warm spot” in his heart for it because it helped get young people to vote for him.

TikTok has been scrambling to find a legal remedy to keep its app in the U.S. as its ban date approaches. In mid-December, The U.S. Supreme Court said it would listen to arguments from TikTok on why it should block the law behind the ban. That crucial hearing is set for Friday.

[From The Wrap]

I know a lot of you disagree with the ban, but as someone who has never had a TikTok account and therefore has no dog in this fight, I think it’s crazy how little people seem to care about the Chinese government potentially having “easy access” to their data. There’s an entire political party that thinks they need AK-47s to defend themselves against the US government because they think there are nanobytes or whatever spying on them through 5G technology. Yet, it’s totally cool for a foreign government to know their personal business? I said it back in April, and I’ll say it again: If you have Senators Liz Warren and Tom Cotton voting the same way based on intelligence briefings they’ve gotten, then there is definitely cause for concern.

All that said, I am absolutely for avoiding a ban by having a U.S. company or investor buy it. It’s even better now that it’s not Steve Mnuchin doing the acquiring! If only someone could only convince Mark Cuban to buy Twitter, lol. I think O’Leary is right to go on Fox and talk up the 47th president’s involvement in a deal happening. Tell that old man whatever he needs to hear to make it happen. I have no idea which way this ban will play out, but I strongly feel that in the end, it’s going to be up to whatever the 47th president tells his cult members to do.

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