‘Why would I want to get rid of TikTok?’: Trump hypocritically backtracks on TikTok ban… again

President-elect Donald Trump is backtracking on the TikTok ban. In 2020, Trump led the charge against TikTok over reasons of national security. This isn’t the first time the president-elect has been wishy-washy with his stance on TikTok.

Trump defended the ByteDance-owned social media app through a Truth Social post. He wrote, “Why would I ban TikTok?” Trump attached a photo of Trump’s social media reach on TikTok. The post alleged that “#trump” has 36 billion total views. Aside from himself, Trump also showed that Christian nationalist Charlie Kirk has over 1.3 billion views, and conservative host Tucker Carlson has 154 million views. Trump’s beloved Fox News has 964 million views through the platform. Interestingly, Trump also brought his former opponent, Kamala Harris, as well as Beyoncé and Taylor Swift, into the fray by showing that they also rake in hundreds of millions of views on the app.

It seems that concerns over national security no longer matter where social media reach is concerned. Trump issued an executive order to ban TikTok during his first term as president. It reads, “TikTok automatically captures vast swaths of information from its users, including Internet and other network activity information such as location data and browsing and search histories.” He then raised the possibility of TikTok siphoning American personal data to the Chinese Communist Party.

Now, Trump is making no mention of espionage and has expressed fondness over TikTok instead. Don’t assume that Trump is merely defending TikTok online. During the 2024 presidential campaign, Trump began expressing support for TikTok. Trump had also met up with TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew at Mar-a-Lago in December 2024. The president-elect then filed a legal brief, urging the US Supreme Court to delay the TikTok ban. His lawyer argued that it would give Trump the “opportunity to pursue a political solution.” Trump isn’t being flippant for the sake of a few cat videos. Democratic strategist Geoff Garin criticized Trump’s change of stance on the issue. He stated, “As with nearly everything Trump does, his change of position is driven by self-interest, not principle or the national interest.”