Trump’s TikTok Extension Flouts the Law. Republicans Say That’s Just Fine.

Before President Donald Trump took office, Senate Republicans were clear about TikTok: Whether he liked it or not, Trump had to enforce the law, which forces the sale of TikTok or — if a sale is unsuccessful — outright bans the popular video app.

But on his first day in office, Trump signed an executive order on TikTok that ostensibly buys more time to “consult with my advisors” and “pursue a resolution that protects national security while saving a platform used by 170 million Americans.”

Under the law, Trump already had 90 days to work out a deal, if the president thinks the Chinese parent company, ByteDance, has made significant progress toward a sale. But Trump is simply directing the Department of Justice to not enforce the law, which was passed with large, bipartisan majorities in both chambers of Congress, signed by then-President Joe Biden and upheld by the Supreme Court as recently as last week.

Trump is, in effect, just ignoring the law.

While GOP lawmakers have practically made a sport out of attacking Democratic presidents for not enforcing laws, Senate Republicans were jumping to Trump’s defense on Tuesday.

“What he did was he took advantage of what is in the law, which says he can delay it for up to 90 days,” Sen. Mike Rounds said, ignoring what Trump’s actual executive order said.

It was a similar story with Sen. Deb Fischer. She told NOTUS Trump has “the authority to be able to have that extension.”

“That was in the law, and so he’s following the law,” Fischer said.

Even some Democrats seemed to think that was true. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a lawyer, said he supported the extension and claimed “President Trump, in effect, is using the law to provide enough time for a sale to take place.”

(Trump is actually ignoring the law and issuing a new executive order to work out a deal.)

While other Republicans were more hesitant to opine on the legality of Trump’s decision, hardly any Senate Republicans that NOTUS spoke with Tuesday said they had a problem with the president ignoring the law.

“Let’s trust President Trump’s judgement on this, let’s see how it goes,” Sen. Lindsey Graham told reporters.

“Hopefully, if the extension is legal, I hope we can find a solution,” he later told NOTUS, adding that he didn’t know “to be honest with you” whether Trump’s executive order was legal.

Sen. Josh Hawley, a lawyer who has frequently been critical of Biden not enforcing immigration laws, said he was “doing something a lawyer should not do, which is I’m commentating when I haven’t actually read the text.”

“So this will probably come back to bite me,” Hawley said, “but my understanding is that what he’s done is he did not necessarily invoke that 90-day provision.”

That part is true. Trump is instead ignoring the deadlines and provisions in the existing law to issue new guidance outside of the law. Hawley actually got closer to expressing discomfort with Trump’s decision than most other GOP senators. He noted that it’s legal, in general, for Trump to direct his DOJ.

“He can do that, but is that a good idea?” Hawley asked. “I don’t know about that.”

Senate Democrats, for their part, were skeptical of Trump just ignoring the TikTok law. Sen. Ed Markey said he “would have preferred” Trump using the “existing statute” for a 90-day extension. “That would have been a better avenue,” Markey said.

“I mean, we passed a law,” Sen. Elissa Slotkin said. “It was bipartisan, and at the time, he supported it.”

Slotkin said she had an issue “with anything that mucks with the division of powers in our country.”

“I can’t understand the present state of play,” Sen. Dick Durbin said. “I thought we had passed a law, signed by the president, that went into effect last weekend, but apparently the new president sees it differently.”

“It’s unusual,” Durbin added.

But most Republicans claimed ignorance about the situation — or just ignored any potential issue with Trump flouting the TikTok law.

Sen. Rick Scott, who told NOTUS repeatedly over the past month that Trump would enforce and follow the ban, said he hadn’t looked at the executive order but would “absolutely” be evaluating it later.

Sen. John Kennedy — another lawyer who studied law at Oxford University and the University of Virginia — told NOTUS that, “Whether I’m OK with it or not, the president’s done it.”

“In fact, I am OK with it,” Kennedy said.

And Sen. Tommy Tuberville was also deferential. “I’ll leave that up to him,” Tuberville told NOTUS. “As long as China’s not into it and controlling it, that’s the big thing — controlling all of it.”

New Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno said TikTok was “in the hands of the greatest negotiator in American history.”

“Maybe President Trump makes a deal, maybe he doesn’t,” Moreno said. “But we’ve now empowered him to see if he could make it happen. I think it’s a great result.”

Still, there were at least two Republicans who expressed discomfort with Trump ignoring the law: Sens. Bill Cassidy and Susan Collins.

“If Congress has passed a law, I think the law has to be enforced,” said Cassidy, who was one of seven GOP senators who voted to impeach Trump four years ago.

Cassidy was careful to note he’s not a lawyer, but he suggested Trump should follow the law. “It’s just — Congress has passed this law,” he told NOTUS.

Collins, another one of the seven Republicans who voted to impeach Trump four years ago, suggested she had an issue with Trump’s new idea of a “joint venture” with ByteDance, where the company would divest at least 50% of its U.S. operations.

“I don’t fully understand how President Trump can suggest that 50% American ownership, or whatever percentage is taken, would be in compliance with the law,” Collins said.

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Nuha Dolby, Emily Kennard and Samuel Larreal are NOTUS reporters and Allbritton Journalism Institute fellows.