By Andrea Shalal and Trevor Hunnicutt
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Vice President JD Vance expects the general terms of an agreement to resolve the ownership of social media platform TikTok in time for an April 5 deadline, according to two White House officials.
TikTok’s fate has been up in the air since a law requiring its Chinese owner ByteDance to either sell it on national security grounds or face a ban took effect on January 19.
U.S. President Donald Trump, after taking office on January 20, signed an executive order seeking to delay by 75 days the enforcement of the law.
The Republican president tapped Vance and national security adviser Michael Waltz last month to oversee the potential sale of the social media app. Last weekend, he said his administration was in touch with four different groups who were interested in a deal.
“There will almost certainly be a high-level agreement that I think satisfies our national security concerns, allows there to be a distinct American TikTok enterprise,” Vance said during an interview aboard Air Force Two with NBC News, which first reported his expectation that deal terms would soon be reached.
One White House official said there may be additional work needed after the April 5 deadline on the finer points of the deal.
TikTok and ByteDance did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
(Reporting by Andrea Shalal and Trevor Hunnicutt; Additional reporting by Juby Babu in Mexico City and Jasper Ward in Washington; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Rod Nickel)
