Mike Walz: Trump Wants to Save TikTok, But He Also Wants to Protect Americans from Chinese Influence

BASH: “Okay, TikTok.”
Walz: “Yeah.”
BASH: “As of this morning, TikTok is dark in the United States. President-Elect Trump said, ‘Save TikTok,’ in just a two-word social media post. I think it‘s pretty clear what he wants to do. The law, of course, says that he does have the ability to put a pause on the ban for 90 days, but only if there‘s significant progress toward a deal to sell it. Is there a viable deal on the table?”
Walz: “Yeah, so, you know, what’s interesting here is, this is about bridging from Sunday to Monday. This is about giving the tech companies, the app stores, the providers, the cloud storage and others the confidence that we are going to work towards some type of deal and to not make this go dark. And I think that‘s what you‘re going to see in the upcoming 24 hours. The president needs optionality and he wants it to evaluate deals that are in accordance with the law, but also protect our national security. And that’s what — “
BASH: “So he’s gonna bring it back on — will he bring it back online on Monday?”
Walz: “Well, we’re working — literally real-time working with the various tech companies to get it back online and buy him some time to, one, save it, but protect Americans’ data and protect Americans from any type of foreign interference.”
BASH: “So, I mean, how do you — how do you do that? I mean, the whole reason why you, in particular, and originally then-President Trump in his first term wanted to get rid of TikTok as it is now, Chinese-owned, is because of the very real national security threat that you see. So how do you keep them, even for 90 days, as a China hawk?”
Walz: “Well, there’s a number — look, I don‘t want the FBI looking at my passports (sic), I don‘t want the Chinese Communist Party looking at my passwords, excuse me, or what‘s going on in my data, or certainly not influencing 170 million Americans. But it is a fantastic app, it‘s something that 170 million Americans enjoy. And we‘re confident that we can save TikTok, but also protect Americans’ data and protect them from influence. Whether that‘s an outright sale, whether that‘s some mechanism of firewalls to make sure that the data is protected here on U.S. soil, that‘s what the president will be evaluating. And I‘ll certainly be helping from a national security standpoint.”
BASH: “So it’s possible that China still still own that. And if so, isn‘t that totally capitulating to China?”
Walz: “No. No, no, no, it‘s not capitulating at all. Again, we can do both. Both can be true at the same time. TikTok can continue to exist. And whether that‘s in American hands, owned by an American company, or whether the data and the algorithms are fully protected from Chinese interference, you know, there‘s a number of, I think, of formulas this could take, but the point right now, Dana, is let‘s get the president some time to make that decision.”