The once-strong political will to force a clean break for TikTok has faded due to the app's massive popularity, lawmaker distraction, and a deal structure that financially benefits political allies. This demonstrates how shifting political priorities and potential self-interest can weaken the enforcement of established national security policies.
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Despite a law requiring TikTok's complete separation from its Chinese owner ByteDance, the approved deal maintains deep operational and financial ties. ByteDance retains a board seat and leases its core algorithm for royalties, effectively creating a superficial compliance that fails to address the law's original national security concerns.
While there is majority public support for banning teen social media use in the U.S., regulation is blocked by 'whataboutism'—a lobbying tactic of raising endless hypothetical objections (e.g., VPNs, privacy) to create legislative paralysis and prevent any action from being taken.
The mandated sale of TikTok's US operations values the company at a fraction of its market worth (~$28B vs. an estimated $120B). This isn't a fair market transaction; it's a politically engineered deal that will hand a massive, near-guaranteed 300-400% return to a select group of connected investors.
The most potent criticism of the U.S. chip controls wasn't flawed strategy, but the chronic underfunding and limited capacity of agencies like the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) to effectively enforce complex export bans against determined adversaries.
As traditional economic-based antitrust enforcement weakens, a new gatekeeper for M&A has emerged: political cronyism. A deal's approval may now hinge less on market concentration analysis and more on a political leader’s personal sentiment towards the acquiring CEO, fundamentally changing the risk calculus for corporate strategists.
The fastest path to generating immense wealth is shifting from pure innovation to achieving regulatory capture via proximity to the president. This strategy is designed to influence policy, secure government contracts, or even acquire state-seized assets like TikTok at a steep discount, representing a new form of crony capitalism.
Despite populist rhetoric, the administration needs the economic stimulus and stock market rally driven by AI capital expenditures. In return, tech CEOs gain political favor and a permissive environment, creating a symbiotic relationship where power politics override public concerns about the technology.
Despite a potential US ownership deal, TikTok remains a national security risk because the core algorithm will still be licensed from China. Control over the information flow to Americans is the real issue, not data storage location, making the deal a superficial fix.
Despite Congress passing and the Supreme Court upholding a law to force a sale of TikTok on national security grounds, the Trump administration is simply not enforcing it. Instead, it's pursuing a private deal, demonstrating how stated national security imperatives can be abandoned for political or business expediency.
The forced sale of TikTok to a hand-picked group of political donors at a steep discount is not a genuine national security solution but a form of cronyism. It bypasses a competitive auction, enriches allies, and likely fails to sever the Chinese government's control over the algorithm, achieving the worst of all outcomes.
