本周，当总统唐纳德·特朗普坚持要求美国政府在以下情况下接受付款微软，或另一家美国公司，收购了中国社交媒体巨头。
特朗普周六表示他会禁止这款应用因为安全问题。几天后，他设定了9月15日行动的最后期限在社交平台TikTok上，允许用户分享短片，以避免禁令。
特朗普周一表示:“这一价格的很大一部分将不得不进入美国财政部，因为我们正在使这笔交易成为可能。”“现在，他们没有任何权利，除非我们给他们。”
美国财政部没有回应美国广播公司新闻关于如果交易成功将如何获得付款的询问。
但通过鲜为人知的美国外国投资委员会，总统确实有权强制出售或命令公司停止运营。该委员会设在美国财政部，负责评估外国投资的国家安全风险。
销售的力量并非没有现代先例。
2019年，美国政府要求同性恋社交网络应用Grindr的所有者放弃他们公司的所有权。外国投资委员会认定，格林德的所有权——中国博彩公司北京昆仑科技有限公司——对国家安全构成了威胁。
美国外国投资委员会最近的工作重点是调查中国对美国有重大影响的公司的投资交易。
在美国外国投资委员会2015年至2017年审查的552笔交易中，超过25%是中国投资。根据一份报告来自战略与国际研究中心。
TikTok的母公司字节跳动没有寻求外国投资委员会的授权当它购买音乐剧时2018年，这也是TikTok目前正在接受委员会调查的原因之一。随着TikTok越来越受欢迎，人们越来越担心中国政府也可能使用该应用程序获取美国公民的信息。
此外，在COVID-19将中国置于危机应对模式之前，立法者呼吁对TikTok进行国家安全调查，发出警报，称其可能审查政治敏感信息，并可能成为中国国家情报机构的工具。
纽约民主党参议员查尔斯·舒默(Charles Schumer)和阿肯色州共和党参议员汤姆·科顿(Tom Cotton)写道:“安全专家表示担心，中国模糊的情报、国家安全和网络安全法迫使中国企业支持和配合中国共产党控制的情报工作。”,在2019年的一封信中致时任国家情报局局长的乔·马奎尔。
信中补充称:“如果没有独立的司法机构来审查中国政府提出的数据或其他行动请求，那么如果中国企业不同意某项请求，就没有法律机制可以上诉。”
周三，国务卿迈克·庞贝抨击TikTok、微信和其他社交媒体应用是“对美国公民个人数据的重大威胁，更不用说对CCP(中国共产党)内容审查的工具。”
他没有宣布对TikTok或其他公司采取任何新的行动，但表示政府希望“看到不受信任的中国应用从美国应用商店中移除。”他说，针对TikTok的行动仍“悬而未决”。
特朗普将出售TikTok的付款比作房东与房客的关系。
特朗普在周一晚上的一个简报会上说:“我用的表达方式就像房东和房客，没有租约，房客就没有价值。”“嗯，我们在某种程度上是租赁。我们使取得这一巨大成功成为可能。TikTok是一个巨大的成功，但很大一部分是在这个国家。”
但专家表示，要求这笔交易付款是没有先例的，将被视为非法。
“我的第一直觉是，这不是一个真正的政策;布鲁金斯学会全球经济与发展项目研究员杰弗里·格特兹说:“特朗普的讲话是在捏造事实。”“美国外国投资委员会中没有任何东西会给与期待付款的权力。目前还不清楚它将如何运作。”
然而，微软证实了其对潜在收购TikTok的兴趣，以及提供政府补偿的兴趣。
该公司表示在一篇博文中“它致力于在经过全面安全审查后收购TikTok，并为美国，包括美国财政部提供适当的经济利益。”
Can Trump demand payment from the Microsoft, TikTok deal? Probably not
The fight for TikTok's future intensified this week when PresidentDonald Trumpinsisted that the U.S. government receive payment ifMicrosoft, or another American company, acquires the Chinese social media giant.
Trump said on Saturday thathe would ban the appin the United States over security concerns. Days later he set a Sept. 15deadline for actionon TikTok, a social platform that allows users to share short videos, to allow it to avoid a ban.
"A very substantial portion of that price is going to have to come into the treasury of the United States because we are making it possible for this deal to happen," Trump said Monday. "Right now, they don't have any rights unless we give it to them."
The Treasury Department did not respond to inquiries from ABC News about how it could receive payment in the event of a successful deal.
But through the little-known Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, which is based at the Treasury Department and evaluates the national security risks of foreign investments, the president does have the authority to either compel a sale or order the company to cease its operations.
The force of a sale is not without modern precedent.
In 2019, the U.S. government demanded the owners of Grindr, a gay social networking app, surrender ownership of their company. CFIUS determined that Grindr's ownership -- Beijing Kunlun Tech Co., a Chinese gaming company -- posed a risk to national security.
The CFIUS has focused its efforts recently on investigating Chinese investment deals into companies with significant U.S. influence.
Of the 552 transactions that CFIUS reviewed between 2015 and 2017, more than 25% were Chinese investments,according to a reportfrom the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
ByteDance, TikTok's parent company, did not seek authorization from CFIUSwhen it purchased Musical.lyin 2018, which is one of the reasons TikTok is now under investigation by the committee. As TikTok increased in popularity, worries grew over the possibility that the Chinese government could also use the app to gain information on U.S. citizens.
Additionally, before COVID-19 put the country in crisis-response mode, lawmakers called for a national security probe into TikTok, sounding the alarm that it could be censoring politically sensitive information and potentially be a tool for Chinese national intelligence agencies.
"Security experts have voiced concerns that China's vague patchwork of intelligence, national security, and cybersecurity laws compel Chinese companies to support and cooperate with intelligence work controlled by the Chinese Communist Party," wrote Sens. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and Tom Cotton, R-Ark.,in a 2019 letterto then-acting Director of National Intelligence Joe Maguire.
"Without an independent judiciary to review requests made by the Chinese government for data or other actions, there is no legal mechanism for Chinese companies to appeal if they disagree with a request," the letter added.
On Wednesday, Secretary of StateMike Pompeoblasted TikTok, WeChat and other social media apps as "significant threats to personal data of American citizens, not to mention tools for CCP (Chinese Communist Party) content censorship."
He did not announce any new action against TikTok or others, but said the administration wants "to see untrusted Chinese apps removed from US app stores." Action against TikTok remains "pending," he said.
Trump has compared payment for the sale of TikTok to a landlord-tenant relationship.
"I use the expression it’s like the landlord and the tenant, and without the lease the tenant doesn't have the value," Trump said at a briefing Monday evening. "Well we are sort of in a certain way the lease. We make it possible to have this great success. TikTok is a tremendous success, but a big portion of it is in this country."
But experts say the demand of payment from the deal is without precedent and would be considered illegal.
"My first instinct is that this is not a real policy; this is Trump making something up as he is speaking," said Geoffrey Gertz, a fellow with the Global Economy and Development Program at the Brookings Institution. "There's nothing in CFIUS that would give the authority to expect a payment. It's not clear how it would work."
Microsoft, however, confirmed both its interest in the potential purchase of TikTok, and in offering up government compensation.
The company saidin a blog post, "it is committed to acquiring TikTok subject to a complete security review and providing proper economic benefits to the United States, including the United States Treasury."
