The Chinese government would reportedly rather see TikTok shut down in the United States than agree to President Donald Trump’s demand for a sale to one of its U.S. suitors.
Chinese officials believe that selling TikTok’s U.S. assets will make both China-based parent company ByteDance and Beijing look weak amid pressure from Washington, Reuters reported, citing sources with direct knowledge of the matter.
Two of the sources claimed that Beijing was willing to delay any deal reached by ByteDance by using revisions that it made to a technology exports list. TikTok’s parent company has been in talks with the likes of Microsoft and Oracle, as it works to meet the mid-September deadline set by Trump.
ByteDance, however, said in a statement to Reuters that there have been no suggestions from the Chinese government that it should shut down TikTok in the U.S.
Digital Trends has reached out to TikTok for further comments on the matter, and we will update this article as soon as we hear back.
Trump will not extend deadline for TikTok
Trump has said that he will not extend the deadline for ByteDance to sell the U.S. assets of TikTok, which leaves open the possibility that the hit video-sharing app will be forced to shut down.
“We’ll either close up TikTok in this country for security reasons or it will be sold. There will be no extension of the TikTok deadline,” said Trump.
The deadline, clarified by Trump to be September 15, is fast approaching, and a recent Bloomberg report claimed that it may be difficult to receive regulatory approval for any sale before that date.
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