TikTok Threatens Legal Action Against President Trump’s Executive Order

The Chinese-owned short-video app says it is ‘shocked’ by order

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TikTok said U.S. President Trump's order sets a 'dangerous precedent' for the concept of free expression and open markets.

Short-form video application firm TikTok threatened to seek legal remedies against an executive order issued by President Donald Trump.

In a statement on Friday (August 7), TikTok said they were ‘shocked’ with the recent White House action banning U.S. companies from transacting business with their parent company ByteDance.

TikTok said the executive order signed on August 6 by U.S. President Donald Trump was issued “without any due process”

The TikTok statement said that for nearly a year they have sought to engage the U.S. government in good faith to provide a constructive solution to the concerns raised by Trump.

“What we encountered instead was that the Administration paid no attention to facts, dictated terms of an agreement without going through standard legal processes, and tried to insert itself into negotiations between private businesses,” the statement said.

The company said the recent order “sets a dangerous precedent” for free expression and open markets as they vowed to pursue all remedies available to them if not by the Trump administration then by the U.S. courts.

Ban worsens US-China tech war

Trump issued separate executive orders to ban TikTok and WeChat particularly their parent companies Bytedance and Tencent from engaging in any business transactions with U.S. companies

The ban will take effect in 45 days and may worsen even more the ongoing technology war between the United States and China.

Trump said TikTok and WeChat are a cause for concern as it “continues to threaten the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States.”

The U.S. President cited the International Emergency Economic Powers Act and the National Emergencies Act as among the laws that grant authority for him to issue both orders.

TikTok, owned by Chinese company ByteDance, has 800 million users worldwide and over 100 million users in the U.S.

Through the app, Trump says TikTok captures “vast swaths of information” that includes Internet and other network activity information such as location data, browsing, and search histories.

According to Trump, the data collected from Americans can be accessed by the Chinese Communist Party thereby gaining access to personal and proprietary information.

‘No due process’ in the issuance of executive order

Despite efforts made by TikTok to remedy the issue by going to the extent of opening discussions of ceding ownership of U.S. operations to tech giant Microsoft, “there has been, and continues to be, no due process or adherence to the law.”

See Related Story: Microsoft Confirms Continuing Talks to Purchase TikTok in the U.S.

Tiktok further said:

“The text of the decision makes it plain that there has been a reliance on unnamed “reports” with no citations, fears that the app ‘may be’ used for misinformation campaigns with no substantiation of such fears, and concerns about the collection of data that is industry standard for thousands of mobile apps around the world.”

As early as last month, TikTok had made it clear in its announcements that it has never shared user data with the Chinese government nor censored content to favor Beijing.

As regards the company’s discussions with Microsoft it will have until September 15 to close a deal with the tech giant.

In an earlier announcement, TikTok US general manager Vanessa Pappas stressed the company is ‘not going anywhere’ and assured users of their security and safety in using the app.

Pappas also said that the company currently has 1,500 U.S. employees and is set to bring more than 10,000 jobs in the country in the next three years. They will also introduce a U.S. Creators Fund amounting to $1 billion to support content creators.

Tencent also reviewing Trump’s order

Meanwhile, another Chinese-owned company, WeChat was also issued an executive order by Trump citing the same national security concerns as TikTok.

With over 1 billion users worldwide, WeChat, owned by Chinese tech giant Tencent, has mainly users from China with only a few users in the U.S.

Most of the messaging and electronic payment app users in the U.S., however, are those from the Chinese diaspora who contact their relatives back home using the WeChat messaging service.

Upon the announcement of the WeChat executive order on Thursday, Tencent’s shares dropped by as much as 5% at the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

Chinese tech giant Tencent owns popular messaging and electronic payment app WeChat which has over 1 billion users mostly from China. Image Source: Tencent

Tencent, responding to the executive order by the White House, told Businessner through a spokesperson that: “We are reviewing the executive order to get a full understanding.”

Aside from WeChat, Tencent also has minor stakes in various American companies including firms such as electric carmaker Tesla, social media company Snap, and social news aggregator Reddit.

The Chinese tech giant also has invested in companies such as music streaming company Spotify and the Universal Music Group.

American videogame makers may also be affected by Trump’s recent executive order as it has significantly invested in companies like Los Angeles-based “League of Legends” developer Riot Games as well as owning minority shares in Activision Blizzard’s “Call of Duty” franchise and popular game “Fortnite” developer Epic Games.


Read More: Trump Issues Executive Orders Banning TikTok and WeChat

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JM Agreda
JM Agreda is a freelance journalist for more than 12 years writing for numerous international publications, research journals, and news websites. He mainly covers business, tech, transportation, and political news for Businessner.