
Prof. Alan Rozenshtein Quoted by CNN About Future Control of TikTok
Professor Alan Rozenshtein was quoted by CNN in regard to Donald Trump’s suggestion that the U.S. start a “sovereign wealth fund” and that TikTok could be “put in” the fund to preserve access to the video app in the United States. But setting up a sovereign wealth fund and then using that fund to acquire the platform is unlikely to happen anytime soon, and TikTok’s deadline for working out a deal is quickly approaching. It’s not clear who would run it or whether it could gather the tens of billions of dollars estimated to be needed to buy the platform. Technically, the proposal could work under the bounds of the sell-or-ban law passed with broad bipartisan support in Congress and signed into law last year by former President Joe Biden. According to Prof. Rozenshtein, for a deal to satisfy the letter of the law, ByteDance can hold no greater than a 20% share in TikTok and there “can be no operational relationship between TikTok and ByteDance going forward.” He added that ByteDance would also have to hand over full control of the TikTok algorithm — which both the company and Chinese officials have previously said they would oppose doing. “That would satisfy the divestment concerns.”