Trump highlighted TikTok's role in attracting a youthful audience in the election

U.S. President-elect Donald Trump told reporters on Dec. 16 that he would look into possibly banning TikTok in the country, and noted its role in attracting a youth audience in the past election.

"We're going to look at TikTok. I have warm feelings about this app because I won the youth audience with a 34 percentage point advantage. Some people believe TikTok played a role in that," he said at a briefing at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida. His words are quoted by the publication Daily Mail.

In addition, Trump noted that his son Barron advised him to pay attention to some particularly popular content creators on the app.

Earlier, on April 24, the current US President Joe Biden signed a law banning the app on the territory of the country. At the time, Congress overwhelmingly approved the measure, claiming possible surveillance of US citizens through the app by the Chinese government. The ban will be lifted if ByteDance sells the U.S. division of TikTok within nine months of the law's passage. They expire at the end of December.

The social network, in turn, said it would defend its rights to operate in the U.S. in court, and the ban would "destroy 7 million companies and disenfranchise 170 million Americans."

Bloomberg reported on April 27 that the TikTok ban would lure young American voters who previously supported the Democratic Party to Trump's side.

American businessman Ilon Musk, commenting on the TikTok ban, pointed out that such a decision contradicts the principles of freedom of speech and expression. In March, Musk said that banning the social network would lead to increased censorship in the United States.