American rapper and record producer, Soulja Boy has expressed interest in acquiring social media app, TikTok.
This comes shortly after the President of the United States, Joe Biden signed a foreign aid package into law that would see the Chinese-owned social media platform banned in the U.S. if it’s not sold within nine months.
President Biden signed the TikTok ‘ban’ bill into law on Wednesday after the Senate passed the bill on Tuesday.
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However, rapper Soulja Boy happens to be the first person to show interest after the bill was signed into law by Joe Biden.
Responding to the newly signed law, the “She Make It Clap” rapper who goes by his legal name DeAndre Cortez Way took to his x account and commented saying if the U.S authorities ban TikTok, they can also ban any other app or site in the future. Which literally means he sees the legislation as an attack on freedom of speech and the First Amendment.
He tweeted; “I can’t believe yall just gon let them ban TikTok like that. And yall think it’s funny. If they do it to this app they can do it to any app or site. Not cool fr yall will see later.”
When another person asked him why not go to another social network, such as Instagram or Facebook, Soulja Boy responded, “You maybe don’t see it now, but TikTok is more important than any other platform right now. That’s why they’re trying to ban it. Trust me.”
And later in a separate post post, the rapper jokingly suggested that he will buy TikTok. Soulja Boy wrote: “How much yall want for TikTok? I’ll buy it. @tiktok_us.”
TikTok has vowed to take legal action against the new law. The app spokesperson, Alex Haurek called the law “unconstitutional” in a statement and vowed to “challenge it in court.”
According to the Associated Press, “a set of Chinese national security laws that require organizations to assist with intelligence gathering poses the most risk.” The Chinese government could compel ByteDance to abide by these laws.
“There are also concerns about China spreading propaganda via the app and using other authoritarian government exercises to control ByteDance.”
To clarify, the bill isn’t solely focused on TikTok. Instead, it is a $95 million spending package encompassing aid funds to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan, while also addressing the potential ban of the short-form video app.
Nevertheless, the enactment of the bill into law by President Biden doesn’t imply that the app will immediately vanish from phones. Regular users won’t face legal repercussions for using it post-ban.
ByteDance has a six-month window to sell TikTok. Additionally, an extra three months are permitted if the sale doesn’t progress. In case the sale is already underway, the company will receive another three months to finalize it.
Should the app remain unsold within those 12 months, the US government will prohibit TikTok from Apple and Google’s app stores, rendering it unavailable for download.
Consequently, TikTok wouldn’t receive updates, security patches, and bug fixes, potentially rendering it unusable over time — not to mention the security risks involved.
However, with expected court challenges, this timeline could extend further, potentially spanning years, according to AP. While TikTok has experienced success with court challenges previously, it has never attempted to halt federal legislation from taking effect.
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