While TikTok has been granted an extension from President-elect Donald Trump, restoring access to more than 170 million U.S. users on Sunday, some are still attempting to purchase the platform.
Among those looking to do so include “Shark Tank” investor Kevin O’Leary, who shared on Friday that he has offered TikTok’s owners $20 billion in cash for the platform.
O’Leary shared his offer with Fox News’s “America’s Newsroom,” just a day before the platform saw access briefly cut off in the U.S.
Trump shared on his platform Truth Social on Sunday that he would take executive action to keep TikTok operating in the U.S. for an extended period of time, which has not been made clear at this time.
The executive order will give TikTok and its China-based parent company, ByteDance, more time to negotiate with U.S. officials as they try to protect national security.
Still, despite his vow to take action, Trump said that he would like to see some type of deal hammered out, as long as it includes TikTok being co-owned with an American company.
“I would like the United States to have a 50% ownership position in a joint venture. By doing this, we save TikTok, keep it in good hands, and allow it to stay up,” Trump wrote. “Without U.S. approval, there is no TikTok. With our approval, it is worth hundreds of billions of dollars - maybe trillions.”
“Therefore, my initial thought is a joint venture between the current owners and/or new owners whereby the U.S. gets a 50% ownership in a joint venture set up between the U.S. and whichever purchase we so choose,” Trump continued.
Despite it being back online, if TikTok had not gone dark on Saturday evening, it could have faced massive fines, as O’Leary broke down during his interview on Friday.
“As of midnight on the 19th, any service provider … that could be an Apple, that could be an Oracle, it could be a video compression technology company that’s being paid as a consulting service, any of them that keep this thing alive is subject to $5,000 a day fine times 170 million,” O’Leary said. “That’s over a billion dollars a day.”
O’Leary also questioned whether or not an executive order from Trump could actually override Congress’s law, saying it remained to be seen.
“We don’t know if an executive order can override a law from Congress,” he said. “There’s a case in 1937 that was used successfully, but you don’t know.”
Still, O’Leary shared Friday that his offer stands as he looks to help play a part in keeping TikTok around long-term.
“Right now, $20 billion is on the table, cash, cash, $20 billion,” O’Leary said.