Donald Trump downplays threat of China using TikTok to spy on Americans

By Justin Sink

 

President Donald Trump downplayed the national security risk posed by TikTok in an interview with Fox News on Wednesday, days after offering the social video app a reprieve from legislation that would have forced it to shut down.

“Is it that important for China to be spying on young people, on young kids, watching crazy videos?” Trump said.

 

Trump suggested all electronic products manufactured in China could carry a spying risk, adding that TikTok’s was not the most serious of them.

 

“They make telephones and they make your computer a lot of other things,” Trump said. “Isn’t that a bigger threat?”

 

During Trump’s first term, he signed an executive order demanding that China’s ByteDance Ltd. divest from US operations of TikTok because of national security concerns. That executive action was ultimately blocked by federal courts, but a bipartisan group of lawmakers codified it into law in 2024. 

 

TikTok has denied that it spies on its users or that it turns over user data to authorities in Beijing. Officials in former President Joe Biden’s administration said that the app collects names, addresses, credit card and purchase information, device and network information, location and GPS location data, biometric identifiers, keystroke patterns, and behavioral data and could be forced to turn that information over at any time.

 

In recent weeks, Trump has credited the app for improving his political standing among young voters, citing that as part of the reason he decided to give ByteDance more time to secure a sale. Under an executive order signed during his first day in office, the president delayed the ban an additional 75 days.

 

Earlier in the week, Trump responded to a reporter’s question about whether he had TikTok on his phone by saying that he would be open to downloading the app. The White House banned TikTok from being installed on government devices over security concerns during Biden’s presidency.