Trump to hold a White House meeting on TikTok as deadline nears

President Donald Trump will meet with Vice President JD Vance and other advisers Wednesday to discuss an offer for TikTok as a deadline nears to keep the social media app running in the United States, two people familiar with the plans told NBC News.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard and national security adviser Michael Waltz are also expected to participate in the Oval Office meeting, one of the sources said.

CBS News first reported the scheduled meeting. White House spokespeople did not immediately respond to requests for additional details.

TikTok’s fate in the United States has been in doubt since last year, when President Joe Biden signed bipartisan legislation that forced the app’s Chinese-based owner, ByteDance, to sell it to a non-Chinese buyer or face a nationwide ban. No such deal came to fruition, and Trump extended the deadline via an executive order on his first day in office, effectively giving TikTok until Saturday to find a solution that would keep it online. Trump also tapped Vance and Waltz to shepherd a deal.

Vance said in an interview last month that he was optimistic he would deliver a workable proposal before the new deadline.

“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.

Rumors have swirled for months about potential buyers for the app, which has millions of users and has been valued at up to $50 billion. But few details have been shared publicly. 

Wyoming entrepreneur Reid Rasner, CEO of the wealth management company Omnivest Financial, told NBC News last month that he offered $47.45 billion. Other suitors have also put their names in the running, including Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, who recently announced he had joined a bid with businessman Frank McCourt.

Trump told reporters Sunday aboard Air Force One that there are “a lot of potential buyers” for TikTok.

“There’s tremendous interest in TikTok,” he said. “The decision is going to be my decision. … We have a great team of people thinking, essentially taking bids. We have a lot of people that want to buy TikTok. We’re dealing with China also on it, because they may have something to do with it.”