By Natalie Andrews, Meridith McGraw and Miriam Gottfried
President Trump will be briefed Wednesday on the contours of a proposal to keep TikTok operational ahead of a pending U.S. deadline to sell or shut it down, according to people familiar with the matter.
Under the framework the president is expected to review, cloud computing company Oracle, along with several others, would join with existing U.S. investors to make an offer to TikTok-owner ByteDance, some of the people said. Blackstone is among the investors in talks to potentially participate in a deal, the people said.
The exact value of TikTok and the size of the investments are expected to be ironed out in later negotiations once the general structure is agreed upon, some of the people said. Vice President JD Vance, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Mike Waltz, Trump's national security adviser and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard are expected to be in attendance at the meeting to discuss the proposal, according to a White House official.
CBS News earlier reported that Trump would consider the proposal and that Blackstone and Oracle were among the potential investors.
The deal to cleave off TikTok's U.S. operations from its global business is as complicated as it is geopolitically fraught and could face extended delays or fall apart based on a variety of factors. Trump officials could also extend the deadline beyond 75 days.
Authorities in Beijing have signaled that China would be open to a deal but see it as part of a cluster of issues it hopes to negotiate with Washington, including tariffs, according to people familiar with the government's thinking. Chinese officials are awaiting Trump's tariff plan to be unveiled on Wednesday.
The president is expected to unveil new broad tariff plans on Wednesday, which he has deemed "Liberation Day."
The ultra-popular social media app briefly went dark in the U.S. earlier this year after a ban effort that originated in Trump's first term.
Congress set a Jan. 19 deadline for TikTok to either divest itself from ByteDance or be banned in the U.S. After he was inaugurated, Trump extended that deadline to April 5. The president credits the video-sharing and livestreaming app for helping him reach younger voters in his campaign.
Trump tasked Vance with developing a plan for U.S.-based investors to purchase the app after Congress banned it last year over national security concerns that ByteDance would give data to the Chinese government. ByteDance has repeatedly said the app isn't for sale.
Write to Natalie Andrews at natalie.andrews@wsj.com, Meridith McGraw at Meridith.McGraw@WSJ.com and Miriam Gottfried at Miriam.Gottfried@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
April 01, 2025 20:38 ET (00:38 GMT)
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