TikTok on Tuesday labeled as “pure fiction” a report that China is exploring a potential sale of the video-sharing platform’s US operations to billionaire Elon Musk as the firm faces an American law requiring imminent Chinese divestment.Citing anonymous people familiar with the matter, Bloomberg News had earlier reported that Chinese officials were considering selling the company’s US operations to Musk’s social media platform X.The report outlined one scenario being discussed in Beijing where X would purchase TikTok from Chinese owner ByteDance and combine it with the platform formerly known as Twitter.”We cannot be expected to comment on pure fiction,” a TikTok spokesperson told AFP.The report estimated the value of TikTok’s US operations at between $40 billion and $50 billion.Although Musk is currently ranked as the world’s wealthiest person, Bloomberg said it was not clear how Musk could execute the transaction, or if he would need to sell other assets.The US Congress passed a law last year that requires ByteDance to either sell its wildly popular platform or shut it down. It goes into effect on Sunday — a day before President-elect Donald Trump takes office.The US government alleges TikTok allows Beijing to collect data and spy on users and is a conduit to spread propaganda. China and ByteDance strongly deny the claims.TikTok has challenged the law, taking an appeal all the way to the US Supreme Court, which heard oral arguments on Friday.At the hearing, a majority of the conservative and liberal justices on the nine-member bench appeared skeptical of arguments by a lawyer for TikTok that forcing a sale was a violation of First Amendment free speech rights.Bloomberg characterized Beijing’s consideration of a possible Musk transaction as “still preliminary,” noting that Chinese officials have yet to reach a consensus on how to proceed.Musk is a close ally of Trump and is expected to play an influential role in Washington in the coming four years.He also runs electric car company Tesla, which has a major factory in China and counts the country as one of the automaker’s biggest markets.Trump has repeatedly threatened to enact new tariffs on Chinese goods, which would expand a trade war begun in his first term and which was largely upheld, and in some cases supplemented, by outgoing President Joe Biden.

Buckle up: Donald Trump returns to the White House next week for a second term that promises to be even more volatile — and hard-line — than his roller-coaster first presidency.Buoyed by his historic political comeback, the billionaire Republican has shown no sign of changing the bombastic style that shook the United States and the world from 2017 to 2021.”If you liked Trump One, you’re going to love Trump Two,” Peter Loge, the director of George Washington University’s School of Media and Public Affairs, told AFP.For all the talk of a more disciplined Trump, the 78-year-old — who will become the oldest person ever sworn in on January 20 — appears to be much the same mercurial figure as last time around.Before even setting foot back in the Oval Office, he has spoken of a new “golden age” even as he vows retribution against opponents and the media, and pledges the mass deportation of illegal migrants.Trump has also set off alarm bells around the globe, issuing outlandish territorial threats against US allies and stoking fears that he will throw Ukraine under the bus to win a peace deal with Russia.”Trump’s character is fundamentally the same,” said David Greenberg, professor of history and journalism at Rutgers University. “What we can expect to see is more of the unexpected.”- New normal – But if anything, Trump 2.0 is set to be even more powerful, and more extreme. A Trump presidency shocked many in 2016, but is now the new normal. Big tech and big business have rallied behind the man they largely shunned in his first term.Crucially Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and boss of the increasingly right-wing X social media platform, is at Trump’s side.”Everybody wants to be my friend,” the president-elect said in December.Many of the guardrails around Trump four years ago are gone, with diehard loyalists replacing the so-called “adults in the room” who tried to moderate his worst instincts.The Republican Party is firmly behind him in a way that wasn’t the case last time. The US House of Representatives and Senate are both in Republican hands — albeit with a tiny majority in the House — and few dare even murmur dissent.”Trumpism is the Republican Party today,” said Jon Rogowski of the University of Chicago, adding that Trump was now “more palatable to a wider range of the political spectrum.”Trump’s stunned critics have largely fallen mute during the transition. The once fervent accusations of “fascism” and authoritarianism have dimmed while even President Joe Biden, who described Trump as a “threat to democracy,” has toned down his rhetoric.Barely mentioned for now is the way Trump ended his first term — in disgrace after his election-denying supporters attacked the US Capitol on January 6, 2021 — or the fact that he will be the first convicted felon to be president.But former special counsel Jack Smith delivered a parting rebuke early Tuesday, in a report detailing Trump’s alleged criminal effort to overturn the 2020 election result that saw Biden win.The report said Trump would have been convicted at trial had Smith not dropped the case after the Republican was elected president in November last year.- ‘Professional wrestling’ -Trump will start his second term in a hurry, knowing that he’s limited to four more years — even if he has mused about a constitution-breaking third term.He is expected to sign around 100 executive actions in his first hours in office, possibly including pardons for some of the January 6 rioters.Trump’s first months are likely to focus on immigration and the economy, his electoral strong points, while Musk will lead efforts to gut the federal government.Trump has also picked an uncompromisingly controversial — and rich — cabinet, including the vaccine-skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for health secretary.On the world stage, Trump is more provocative than ever. He has refused to rule out military action against strategic Greenland and Panama, while threatening US trading partners and neighbors Canada and Mexico with huge tariffs.Conversely, Trump says he wants talks with the leaders of Russia and China, strongmen he has long openly admired.The question is just how seriously Trump’s threats should be taken.”A really good metaphor for President Trump is professional wrestling,” said Loge. “The point is not the sport, the point is the spectacle.”This time around, the world may be more ready to deal with him, Loge added. “In the first Trump administration people responded to the spectacle. This time we may be responding more to the sport.”

Donald Trump’s cabinet nominees go under the microscope in a frenzied week on Capitol Hill starting Tuesday, as US senators hold confirmation hearings that could make or break their political careers.Thirteen nominees will be grilled before 11 committees, and while many will sail through, others face controversies ranging from alleged sexual assault and heavy drinking to their relationships with dictators and vaccine skepticism.The Trump picks have been in stringent preparations, taking part in mock hearings and coaching on how to negotiate tough questions while still maintaining unswerving loyalty to the president-elect.”This time, people view the nominees as an extension of Donald Trump and his agenda,” Sean Spicer, Trump’s first White House spokesman, told CNN.”They’re not there to defend their own views. They’re there to defend Trump’s policies.” Senate Republicans are keen for Trump’s national security nominees to be confirmed quickly and Democrats may agree to fast-track some. But they are determined to throw up roadblocks in front of candidates they see as unfit.One of the first on the docket will be one of the most controversial — Pete Hegseth, the former Army National Guard officer and ex-Fox News host nominated for secretary of defense.Hegseth, whose hearing is on Tuesday morning, has faced allegations of sexual assault, financial misconduct and excessive drinking, and lingering questions over his views on women in the military. He also has no comparable management experience.Senator Elizabeth Warren, a member of the Armed Services Committee, described Hegseth as “a guy with a track record of being so drunk at work events that he needed to be carried out on multiple occasions.””Can we really count on calling Hegseth at 2AM to make life and death national security decisions? Nope,” she said on X.Hegseth can only afford three Republican rejections and still be confirmed, should every Democrat and independent vote against him.- Fiery hearings -But he has maintained Trump’s support while the excoriating headlines have multiplied and Senate Republicans appear open to hearing him out.Former Democratic congresswoman turned Trumpist Tulsi Gabbard is another candidate whose lack of qualifications and experience have raised alarm bells, as well as her attitudes toward US adversaries.Gabbard met then Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in 2017 and declared him “not the enemy.” She has also voiced sympathy for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.Opposition appears to be softening however after she flipped her stance to support a controversial government intelligence-gathering program that she tried to repeal in 2020. Some pressure on the nominees is expected from both sides of the aisle, especially for Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s nominee for secretary of health and human services and an anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist.But former Florida senator and foreign policy hawk Marco Rubio, Trump’s pick for secretary of state, is a sure bet with bipartisan support, and will likely be confirmed before Trump takes office on January 20.Rubio gets his hearing Wednesday, along with homeland security secretary nominee Kristi Noem, attorney general nominee Pam Bondi and CIA pick John Ratcliffe, who has been confirmed by the Senate before, as director of national intelligence.Bondi was Trump’s second choice after his initial pick, former Florida congressman Matt Gaetz, withdrew from consideration after facing sexual misconduct and drug-taking allegations.Some of the most potentially fiery hearings are yet to be scheduled, including for Kennedy and Kash Patel, Trump’s nominee to run the FBI.Patel — a conspiracy theorist who vowed in a podcast that Trump would “come after” journalists, lawyers and judges he believes haven’t treated him fairly — is not expected to get his confirmation hearing until February.Early Tuesday, Trump’s team lost a bid to prevent the release of a report by then-special counsel Jack Smith detailing the incoming president’s alleged criminal effort to overturn the 2020 election result that saw Joe Biden win.The report said Trump would have been convicted at trial — had Smith not dropped the case after the Republican was elected president in November last year.