Apple and Google have brought TikTok back to their respective app stores a little more than three weeks after removing it, following the implementation of a federal ban on the short-form video app that took effect the day before President Trump’s second inauguration.
TikTok, of course, remains one of the most popular apps worldwide, and Apple was no doubt especially keen to bring back the app ahead of the launch of new iPhones. However, while the app is as of this writing once again available to download, that doesn’t mean its legal headaches have been resolved.
Here’s why. Amid the flurry of executive orders that President Trump signed the day he returned to the White House, one of them included his delay on enforcement of the TikTok ban. That delay extends for 75 days from the date of Trump’s order, in the hope that a sale of some sort can be worked out in the interim that satisfies American concerns.
In the meantime, Apple and Google delayed bringing the app back to their app stores — both companies were concerned about the possibility that President Trump might not have the constitutional authority to direct his Justice Department not to enforce a ban that was duly passed by Congress. Rather than risk the potential of huge fines, both companies delayed bringing TikTok back to their app stores.
US Attorney General Pam Bondi has reportedly sent a letter to Apple assuring the company that restoring TikTok for the time being doesn’t violate the law (presumably, that same assurance was provided to Google). Google, however, is reportedly only keeping the app in its store through the end of the 75-day extension. Furthermore, there are still significant hurdles to getting any sale completed. Any deal at all that involves US investors buying TikTok would need the approval of China’s government — with that controlling decision, by the way, proving why the US enacted a ban in the first place.
Here’s a look back at how TikTok increasingly found itself in the crosshairs of US lawmakers over the past several years.
