Widener University Commonwealth Law School
MONTH-IN-BRIEF (Apr 2024)
The Final Countdown: President Biden Signs Potential TikTok Ban into Law
By Christopher John and Jim Sandy, McGlinchey Stafford PLLC
On April 24, 2024, President Biden signed a sweeping foreign aid package into law. Tucked into the law is a slightly amended version of the “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act” (the Act), which will force TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, to sell TikTok or have it banned in the U.S. A nearly identical version of the Act passed the U.S. House of Representatives in March 2024, but at that time, the Act faced an uncertain future in the Senate. However, proponents of the Act in the U.S. House of Representatives saw an opportunity to pass the Act by including it within the foreign aid package that both the Senate and President Biden were eager to pass.