Trump says Lachlan and Rupert Murdoch might invest in TikTok deal
The Trump administration has been talking up a potential TikTok deal this weekend, with President Donald Trump telling Fox News on Sunday that Rupert Murdoch and his son Lachlan are “probably” going to be involved.
“A man named Lachlan is involved,” Trump said. “Lachlan Murdoch … Rupert [Murdoch] is probably gonna be in the group, I think they’re going to be in the group.”
The president also said that Oracle executive chairman Larry Ellison and Dell Technologies CEO Michael Dell are likely to be involved.
While Trump did not specify whether he was talking about personal or company investments, following his comments, Deadline reported that Fox Corp — owner of Fox News, run by CEO Lachlan Murdoch, and long led by chairman emeritus Rupert — is in fact in talks to join the investor group backing TikTok’s U.S. spinoff from owner ByteDance.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt previously appeared on Fox News on Saturday and said that an agreement has been reached — but not signed — that would see TikTok’s U.S. operations spun out under majority American ownership.
Leavitt said Americans will hold six of seven board seats in the restructured TikTok, and the short-form video app’s algorithm will be U.S.-controlled, according to Bloomberg.
“So all of those details have already been agreed upon, now we just need this deal to be signed and that will be happening, I anticipate, in the coming days,” Leavitt said.
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Bloomberg also reported that a senior White House official said new investors in TikTok will include Oracle, Andreessen Horowitz, and private equity firm Silver Lake Management, with Oracle responsible for the app’s security and safety. ByteDance would reportedly own less than 20% of the spun off company.
A federal bill passed last year was set to ban TikTok in January, shortly before Trump returned to office, and the app briefly went dark in the United States. But Trump repeatedly extended the deadline for ByteDance to sell the app to new owners. He said Friday that China’s president Xi Jinping had approved the deal, and TikTok also issued a statement thanking Xi and Trump “for their efforts to preserve TikTok in the United States.”
“ByteDance will work in accordance with applicable laws to ensure TikTok remains available to American users through TikTok U.S.,” the company said.
This post and headline have been updated with Trump’s comments about Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch.
Anthony Ha is TechCrunch’s weekend editor. Previously, he worked as a tech reporter at Adweek, a senior editor at VentureBeat, a local government reporter at the Hollister Free Lance, and vice president of content at a VC firm. He lives in New York City.
