JUST IN: Pro-Trump Investors Take Step Towards Buying TikTok

Former Trump Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin is spearheading an effort by American investors to acquire the Chinese company TikTok at the same time Congress is considering a new law that would require the social media giant to sever its ties with the country’s communist government.

According to CNBC, Mnuchin is in the process of forming an investor group to approach ByteDance, which owns TikTok, with an offer that would allow the popular app to remain available in the U.S. A sale would likely number in the hundreds of billions of dollars, as Pitchbook currently values the company at $220 billion.

Speaking about legislation passed by the U.S. House to restrict TikTok’s Chinese ownership, Mnuchin said he favors the move, adding lawmakers have an obligation to prevent TikTok from being abused by China’s government to mine and monitor Americans’ personal data.

“I think the legislation should pass and I think it should be sold,” Mnuchin said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” Thursday. “It’s a great business and I’m going to put together a group to buy TikTok.”

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The bill is receiving widespread bipartisan support and does not fall neatly along the right-left schism. President Joe Biden said he would sign the bill into law if it reaches his desk, and the Senate is now tasked with considering the present bill or amending it and sending it back to the House for further review.

“This should be owned by U.S. businesses. There’s no way that the Chinese would ever let a U.S. company own something like this in China,” Mnuchin said.

By its own estimates, TikTok counts as many as 170 million users, providing China with a tremendous ability to influence the viewing habits of Americans, especially young voters. Chinese authorities have been cool to the idea of a forced sale, saying it’s not on the table and lawmakers are using “robber’s logic,” according to China Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin.

The reasoning is shared with other notable tech inventors and investors including Peter Thiel, Vinod Khosla, and Keith Rabois.

Mnuchin served as Treasury Secretary for most of President Donald Trump’s four-year term, during which time the administration took a mostly antagonistic approach toward TikTok and teased its own plans to crack down on the social media company. However, after speaking with a number of supporters, including some who have a stake in TikTok’s success, President Trump has come out against the new legislation, further complicating GOP efforts to strip TikTok of its overseas owners.