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TikTok is on track be banned in the U.S. this Thursday

11 November 2020
 Dan Ackermann

TikTok is on track be banned in the U.S. this Thursday, although it remains unclear whether the Trump administration will follow through or if a judge will intervene.

Why it matters: The short-video entertainment and social networking app is estimated to have around 100 million U.S. users and more than 1,500 U.S. employees.

No, you're not experiencing déjà vu.

President Trump originally ordered a ban on new downloads of TikTok to take effect on Sept. 30, with the service to be shuttered on Nov. 12 unless it was purchased by a U.S. entity.

  • A federal judge granted an injunction against the download ban just hours before it was set to take effect, and a different federal judge later granted an injunction against the Nov. 12 shutdown.

But, but, but: The Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. (CFIUS) also set a Nov. 12 deadline for when ByteDance, TikTok's Chinese parent company, must unwind a 2018 acquisition that effectively created TikTok.

  • CFIUS has the ability to extend the deadline by 30 days, but has not yet done so.
  • CFIUS and ByteDance continue to negotiate over an arrangement whereby a group of U.S. entities — including venture capital firms, Oracle and Walmart — would hold a majority stake in TikTok, but no final deal has been struck.

If an extension is not granted and no deal is agreed upon, the Justice Department "is authorized to take any steps necessary" to enforce the CFIUS order. It remains unclear if ByteDance would risk legal action by keeping TikTok operational, or how fast a court might act in response to a DOJ request.

What new: TikTok on Monday asked a federal judge to intervene. In a statement, the company said:

"For a year, TikTok has actively engaged with CFIUS in good faith to address its national security concerns, even as we disagree with its assessment. In the nearly two months since the President gave his preliminary approval to our proposal to satisfy those concerns, we have offered detailed solutions to finalize that agreement – but have received no substantive feedback on our extensive data privacy and security framework.

The bottom line: Even if President-elect Biden's administration plans to reverse Trump's executive order and the existing CFIUS ruling, those moves would not come before the current deadlines.

Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times

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Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.

Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.

The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.

  • The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.

What the transcripts say:

  • Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
  • The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
  • Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."

Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.