The United States announced this Saturday that it will control the board of directors that will supervise Tiktok operations in the country under the social network of videos can continue operating in the US. Six of the seven positions of the board of directors of the application will be occupied by Americans and the Chinese company Bytedance will appoint the seventh member, said the White House Secretary of the White House, Karoline Leavitt.
“This agreement means that Tiktok will become the majority property of Americans in the United States,” Leavitt said in Fox News on Saturday morning. The press secretary added that the Oracle Technology company, directed by Larry Ellison, a nearby ally of President Donald Trump and who last week briefly surpassed Elon Musk as the richest person in the world with fortune more than 140,000 million dollars, will be commissioned, in collaboration with the United States government, of the security of the application, which, according to the official, will be signed in “the next day”.
The White House announcement comes after Trump maintained on Friday a phone call with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, after which the Republican reported that the two leaders had reached an agreement for Tiktok to continue working in the United States.
A bipartisan group of legislators approved a law in 2024 to prohibit application for US users in January 2025 if its Chinese owner, Bytedance, did not sell its assets in the United States, a decision that the Supreme Court ratified.
Trump, however, has challenged that prohibition with continuous extensions through executive orders while negotiations continue. Earlier this week, the president suspended any possible prohibition until December 16, after his administration said that a “frame” had been reached for an agreement.
The details of that framework have not yet been made public, beyond the details relieved this Saturday. But he has been a key element of negotiations, since in recent years in Congress, concern has grown up for the possibility that China spread propaganda through application or manipulates what Americans see on social networks. Under the pact, the data of US users will be stored in the US, without China having access to them, another important point in negotiations.
Oracle is one of the world’s largest technology companies, specialized in software Business, databases and cloud services. It has multiple acquired companies, which together form a global technological ecosystem, with annual revenues of more than 50,000 million dollars. Its founder, Larry Ellison, has a long career with the Republican party, has attended several dinners in the residence that Trump possesses in the Mar-A-Lago resort, and has met with the US president in the Oval Office of the White House.
It is anticipated that they maintain an approximate participation of 80% as part of the agreement, leaving Bytedance with less than 20%. It is also expected that one of the members of the Board of Directors of the new US entity be appointed by the United States government, according to Forbes.
“We are 100% sure that the agreement is closed, now it is only necessary to sign it and the president’s team is working with his Chinese counterpart to do so,” Leavitt said this Saturday. Trump recognizes “the need to protect the privacy and data of Americans, while this application remains open,” said the secretary, and adding that Tiktok is “a vital part” of the American democratic process.
