Big Tech executives sue Trump and Bondi over TikTok deal
Two Big Tech investors filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi, challenging the TikTok deal announced in January. They argue the deal violates the 2024 Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications act (the TikTok Law), which requires ByteDance to sever its operational relationship with TikTok in the United States.
– Plaintiffs: Zhaocheng Anthony Tan (an Alphabet Inc. investor) and Garrett Reid (a Meta investor) filed the suit in the U.S. court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
– Core claim: The arrangement would leave ByteDance in control of essential elements of TikTok and fail to truly divest, undermining the law’s purpose to prevent Chinese influence or censorship through the app.
– Context: The TikTok Law set a January 19, 2025 deadline for divestment, with extensions considered during 2025 as the administration worked to address national security concerns.
– Deal details: The U.S.entity would be part of a joint venture owned by American investors, including Oracle, Silver Lake, and MGX (each with 15%), with additional involvement from Michael Dell’s investment firm. The process evolved over time, culminating in a finalized arrangement in January 2026 after TikTok pledged to sell its U.S. operations.
– Additional criticisms: The petitioners claim financial harm as investors in TikTok’s rivals and allege the deal rewarded allies with personal enrichment, pointing to donors and connections tied to MAGA-related organizations.
– Overall implication: The plaintiffs contend the deal keeps ByteDance too deeply involved, contradicting the stated goal of the TikTok Law to curb Chinese influence and content control in the U.S.
Big Tech executives sue Trump and Bondi over TikTok deal
A pair of Big Tech shareholders sued the Trump administration on Thursday over the deal it reached with TikTok in January, claiming the deal violates a 2024 law that calls for Chinese owner ByteDance to cease its operation with the app in the United States.
Zhaocheng Anthony Tan, an investor in Alphabet Inc., and Garrett Reid, an investor in Meta, are the two plaintiffs in the lawsuit filed against President Donald Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi, who argue the administration’s TikTok deal did not cut off ByteDance’s “operational relationship” with the U.S. TikTok entity. The suit was filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
“In short, under the announced deal, ByteDance would still control all the essential elements of TikTok,” the lawsuit reads. “Such a deal would subvert the very purpose of the TikTok Law, as ByteDance could continue to push Chinese propaganda and censor the content it does not like, exactly the harm that the law was intended to prevent.”
The petitioners refer to the “Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act” as the “TikTok Law.” The law gave TikTok a Jan. 19, 2025, deadline to completely divest from its Chinese parent company or face a ban in the U.S. Trump announced several extensions of the deadline over the course of 2025 before unveiling a plan to save the app, used by hundreds of millions of people in the U.S., in September 2025.
After TikTok vowed to sell its U.S. entity to a joint venture group of several U.S. investors in December 2025, the Trump administration finalized the deal in January 2026. Oracle, Silver Lake, and MGX each own 15% of the venture as the three managing investors. The CEO of Dell, Michael Dell’s personal investment firm, is another investor in the company.
Dell is a financial backer of Trump’s new Trump Accounts, and Oracle was co-founded by Larry Ellison, another ally of the president.
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The petitioners of the lawsuit said they “suffered financially” after the deal was announced, as they are investors in TikTok’s competitors. The petitioners also claim that “the deal the President approved rewarded allies who personally enriched him,” pointing to Ellison and political donations to MAGA, Inc. from Jeff Yass of Susquehanna and William Ford of General Atlantic.
The Washington Examiner has reached out to the White House for comment.
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