On the evening of Jan. 18, TikTok servers in the United States shut down, causing the app to go dark for the night.
Around noon on Jan. 19, the servers were back up, allowing American users back onto the app again. A notification displayed on users’ phones stated the app was back due to a “result of President Trump’s efforts.”
The shutdown wasn’t an accident. It wasn’t out of fear of the ban. The Biden administration had already expressed it had no intention of enforcing the TikTok ban. Biden was leaving the decision up to then-President-Elect Donald Trump.
However, the app went dark anyway.
The app shutting down on the eve of Jan. 18 seemed to be a purely political move that younger generations in the country need to be aware of.
It didn’t all begin that night though. The past week has been a minefield of distrust, not between the right and the left, but between the top and the bottom.
The day the Supreme Court announced its decision to uphold the law banning the app, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew posted a video to his platform praising Donald Trump.
“We are grateful and pleased to have the support of a President who truly understands our platform,” Chew said in the video, which has garnered over 26.1 million views. “One who has used TikTok to express his own thoughts and perspectives, connecting with the world and generating more than 60 billion views of his content in the process.”
To have the CEO of such a beloved app outright show such devotion to one singular figure is frightening. The American public has been able to witness firsthand what comes out of being a rich businessman and aligning yourself with Trump – more power.
Not only were Chew, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk in attendance at Trump’s Monday inauguration, but Musk has been named to be in charge of government efficiency efforts under Trump.
People online also believe these tech giants have been catering their platforms to appease Trump.
Meta, headed by Zuckerberg, has been rolling out drastic changes in the weeks leading up to the inauguration. Meta announced it would be scrapping its old fact-checking system and replacing it with something closer to X’s Community Notes.
Employees from within Meta seemed to be concerned about the change, fearing it would lead to more misinformation being spread on the platform.
Many people feel it’s not a coincidence Meta changed a key part of their platform to closely mirror Musk’s X. With Musk being known as part of Trump’s inner circle, it would not be surprising if Zuckerberg was trying to win himself some of that favor.
With that said, it is clear that there is a concerning amount of tech giants that seem to be playing into Trump’s hands. TikTok seems to be the next one.
When TikTok went dark on Jan. 18, a message popped up on users’ phones notifying them that “President Trump has indicated that he will work with us on a solution to reinstate TikTok once he takes office.”

No less than fourteen hours later, the app was back up again, with another notification saying it was all thanks to Donald Trump – despite him not being in office yet.

As mentioned previously, this can be seen as nothing more than a power play. This was TikTok pandering to Trump. This was nothing more than blatant propaganda.
Shutting down the app was a power move. It was something to remind the people of who was truly in control – and it wasn’t them.
Bringing the app back online and directly praising Trump for doing so wasn’t a simple thank-you. It was a show of power. It was an attempt to portray Trump as the savior of TikTok to the millions of users out there. It was nothing more than pro-government, pro-Trump propaganda.
The number one thing to keep in mind here is that Trump was the one to initially propose the ban, all the way back in 2020. Now, he’s using it to make himself and his presidency seem even better.
Many users on TikTok have also recognized this, and begun to voice their concerns over the brief blackout and pro-Trump messaging from a massive corporation.
“I literally have such an ick from Tiktok and the government pulling this PR stunt last night,” TikTok user @theblondeinpink said in a video. “It’s so manipulative.”
“Now I’m gonna need every single one of you to remember that this entire thing was a theatrical stunt to make Trump seem like a savior,” said another user, @nicolebrennan.draws, in a video.
All of this to come after President Biden’s farewell address warning of an emerging oligarchy in the country has tensions high.
“We’ve been living in an oligarchy,” TikTok user @beethebee._ posted in a video. “It’s been top vs. bottom. It’s been rich vs. poor. Biden saying that didn’t confirm anything. He was saying what we all subconsciously knew.”
Many TikTok users are becoming more and more aware of the increasing divide in class, especially when it comes to politics. If anything, the TikTok ban has only opened more eyes.“Watching the political theater of the TikTok ban has made me even more anti-government than I already was,” TikTok user @nilaathompson said in a video. “It is not about republican vs. democrat. It is about bottom vs. top.”
The most important thing to do moving forward is to stay vigilant. Examine all the content you consume, and be wary of what may be lightly veiled propaganda.
If TikTok is willing to be so obvious in their pandering to be at the top with Trump, who knows what’s going on behind the scenes?
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Commentary Writer Emma Hardesty can be reached at [email protected].