Murdochs likely to join US TikTok deal, Trump says
Trump says Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch are likely to participate in a group of investors seeking TikTok's U.S. operation, with Oracle and Dell executives also expected to be involved as a sale advances.
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump said in a Fox News interview aired Sunday that Rupert Murdoch and his son Lachlan are likely to be part of a group of investors seeking to buy TikTok's U.S. operation. He also said Oracle founder Larry Ellison and Dell founder Michael Dell would probably be involved, describing the men as American patriots and saying they would raise a substantial amount of money for the purchase. The comments come as U.S. officials push to resolve the future of TikTok in a way that satisfies a law passed by Congress in April 2024, which would ban the app unless its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, sells its U.S. arm. Enforcement of the law is currently on hold while talks continue.
Lachlan Murdoch has recently taken control of Fox Corp and News Corp, ending a long-running family leadership transition. Rupert Murdoch remains a senior figure and chairman emeritus of News Corp. While Trump did not spell out how the Murdochs would participate, U.S. media reporting has suggested that any investment could be routed through Fox Corp rather than the individuals personally. The involvement of Ellison and Dell would add two Silicon Valley figures with long-running ties to American technology and business communities to the effort, according to Trump.
On the White House side, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said a deal could be signed in the coming days. She reiterated that U.S. data and privacy protections for TikTok would be led by Oracle, and that the algorithm running the service would be controlled by the United States. Those assurances are central to the administration's effort to transfer control of TikTok’s U.S. operations away from ByteDance to American oversight.
China has not publicly confirmed any deal. Beijing’s position was echoed in a report by Xinhua, which referenced Trump’s conversation with Chinese President Xi Jinping as welcoming negotiations. China’s Commerce Ministry issued a statement reiterating that Beijing respects the wishes of the enterprise and supports commercial negotiations conducted under market rules to reach a solution compliant with Chinese laws while balancing interests. ByteDance has not commented on Trump’s latest remarks.
TikTok serves roughly 170 million users in the United States, and the April 2024 law that would ban the app absent a sale has fueled a push across both the executive and legislative branches to resolve the matter swiftly. The administration has framed the negotiations as a test of data security and national sovereignty in a data-driven tech era, with a focus on who controls both the data and the platform’s underlying recommendation algorithms.
If a sale proceeds, it would mark a notable convergence of prominent American investors and a family-led media empire with a portfolio spanning major outlets and platforms. The public stance from Washington remains that the deal, terms, and protections must ensure American data remains under American oversight, while China emphasizes market-based negotiations and compliance with its laws. ByteDance has not offered public remarks on the ongoing discussions, and the specifics of any anticipated agreement remain subject to negotiations among the parties involved and regulatory review.