Many US citizens were dreading Jan. 19, 2025, the day TikTok was intended to be banned. In turn, TikTok was banned the night of Jan. 18; this created a buzz for several hours which quickly died down because by the morning of Jan. 19, TikTok was back and running. Many users were facing confusion because TikTok’s ban lasted only 12 hours. Due to this confusion, conversations were sparked about whether Trump was overseeing TikTok or not, mainly because of TikTok’s messages within these two days.
TikTok’s ‘goodbye’ message on Jan. 18 consisted of an apology and an explanation. Alongside the explanation was an expression of hope that (soon to be) President Trump would save TikTok. This part of the message confused many users because Trump had yet to be inaugurated; the inauguration of President Trump occurred two days later. Consequently, questions, memes, and threads about the TikTok ban and Trump’s role in it swarmed the internet.
The next day, following the ‘goodbye’ message, there was a ‘welcome back message’ expressing joy over how “President Trump’s efforts” brought TikTok back. This message made some believe that Trump is a ‘savior’. As a result, some on TikTok have voiced that they idolize him for bringing TikTok back, but they didn’t realize that he started the ban. Many US citizens have noticed the impact of this message as the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel stated, “What matters is that over 150 million Americans saw a message from TikTok thanking Trump.” Authorities (like Trump on Twitter) have used social media to inform and convince the public, and that’s exactly what this message did.
The President seems to have changed his mind in regard to TikTok because on May 15, 2019, according to WhiteHouse.gov, Trump declared in an Executive Order that, “…Action must be taken to address the threat posed by one mobile application in particular, TikTok.” The idea of TikTok posing a threat began because it is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance Ltd. Clearly, Trump intended to ban TikTok back in 2019. Therefore, it’s clear that Trump wasn’t always in favor of TikTok
The New York Times similarly touched on this topic in 2020, “Mr. Trump’s effort to ban TikTok was blocked by a federal judge, who ruled that he had exceeded his authority.” This emphasizes Trump’s intentions even further. Although his effort was blocked, “[Former] President Biden then revoked Mr. Trump’s ban in 2021 as Congress considered new legislation.” This proves Trump’s initial intentions to be clear: he wanted TikTok gone. After Biden revoked Trump’s ban, Trump came across as the bad guy.
Many current TikTok users may have forgotten this information, leaving users to think that Trump got exactly what he wanted: to be viewed as a hero for ‘saving’ TikTok. Though there are people who view him that way, others don’t because they have noticed significant changes on the app since “Trump’s efforts” saved it.
Many users have expressed support towards Trump ever since TikTok was restored; many US citizens are wondering if this was his intent. To many, it seemed like he made himself out to be the hero, so TikTok fans would idolize him. The majority of TikTok users are Gen Z: A generation that tends to lean democratic. In 2020, among registered voters, a January Pew Research Center survey found that 61% of Gen Z voters expressed that they were most likely voting democrat. Therefore, Trump took matters into his own hands to gain more supporters through TikTok.
Previously, TikTok has been a place where creators can freely share their political opinions, current events, or report significant political news. For example, users would post videos expressing their negative opinions about the presidential candidates, or simply post a screenshot of a tweet from Trump. As an avid TikTok user myself, I loved coming across insightful and opinionated political videos. Ever since TikTok was revived on Jan. 19, political TikToks have been limited. Many videos that have come up on my For You Page express their concern for the lack of protests and political complaints they have seen on the app; I have noticed this as well and it has been upsetting.
Many political aspects of the app changed when referring to the First Amendment and freedom of speech, which is weird because this is why it was originally going to be banned. Although it isn’t professional, users leave hashtags on their videos expressing negativity towards politicians: #F***Trump and #F***Biden. According to Fox News, ever since the renewal of TikTok, the hashtag #F***Trump has had no uses and isn’t an official hashtag. While some might think this is to be courteous to politicians as a whole, TikTok shows otherwise. Biden’s hashtag is still official and shows the amount of uses. Though some may think this is a small issue, it doesn’t stop there.
Previously, videos would go under review if they were offensive, a threat, or contained nudity. Now, many more videos go under review and right after the ban, this has been recognized and voiced by TikTok users. Theories have been made that this is because of the negativity people express about President Trump. Although this theory has yet to be confirmed, the stars align quite well in his favor.
The last restriction of the First Amendment that users have noticed is the restriction of sending videos. There are still TikToks out there regarding Trump; TikTok has just made it a hassle to share those videos. When trying to send the Trump TikToks to more than one person, it gives you a message: “Sharing is limited to one chat at a time. This is to help limit the spread of potentially harmful content.” If the content was harmful, this message would be understandable, but the videos in which this message appears on are not harmful. For example, when attempting to share a video explaining the countries that Trump is not allowed in (due to his status as a convicted felon) the message appeared. This TikTok was neither harmful nor negative but despite simply being informative, it could be seen as a threat in Trump’s eyes. Although Trump may be threatened by content like this video, it goes against the First Amendment (freedom of speech) to restrict users from sharing videos.
All of these changes, which protect Trump, violate the First Amendment. This has led many users to grow concerned and they have been led to believe that Trump is overseeing, or at least heavily influencing TikTok. In an interview with the AP News, Bill Bishop, a China expert who has been closely following the back-and-forth shared, “‘…He will be rewarded both by users’ as well as the company, which he said is now ‘beholden to Trump’ and will have an incentive to make sure content on the platform is favorable to him.”
