CBS News reported that Shou Chew, CEO of TikTok , and Sundar Pichai CEO of Google are both expected to attend the inauguration ceremony for President-elect Donald Trump.
News of the ban comes just as a new law, owned by Chinese company ByteDance and intended to take effect on January 19, is about to be passed. The Supreme Court weighs the legality of law but seemed to be prepared to uphold it following arguments last week.
The future of TikTok is still unclear. The app could be shut down as early as January 19, but the Justice Department is still figuring out the best way to enforce the law.
The New York Times was the first to report about the inauguration.
Chew and Trump met in December. Trump had said before the meeting that TikTok was “a special place in my heart.” Trump tried to ban TikTok during his first term.
In a segment of his farewell speech on Wednesday night, President Biden warned about the “tech industrial complex” that is coming. He said it gives him “great concerns.”
Biden stated that “Americans have been buried beneath an avalanche misinformation, disinformation, and lies which has enabled the abuse of authority.” “The free media is in ruins. Errors are disappearing. The social media has stopped fact-checking. “The truth is suppressed by lies that are told to gain power and profit.” He added that “artificial Intelligence is the most important technology of our day, if not of all times.”
