TikTok ban: Could the bill make it all the way to Biden's desk?

The House of Representatives voted in favor of a bill banning TikTok from the US if its parent company, Chinese media company ByteDance, doesn't divest from the social media app. The bill now heads to the Senate where its fate is not assured. Many on Wall Street and in the political sphere debate as to whether this bill can make it all the way to President Biden's desk.

Yahoo Finance Senior Columnist Rick Newman joins the Live show to discuss the bill, the possibility of its passing in the Senate, and what this situation could mean for Biden if he were to actually sign the bill into law.

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Yahoo Finance Live.

Editor's note: This article was written by Nicholas Jacobino

Video Transcript

RACHELLE AKUFFO: Well, the House this week passing a bill that could potentially lead to a ban of ByteDance app TikTok. Now it faces a slower path in the Senate. Let's bring in Yahoo Finance's Rick Newman to give us those details. So Rick, here we are potentially Senate bound what should we be expecting.

RICK NEWMAN: Well, at this point I'm comfortable saying that I don't think this is going to get through the Senate in 2024. And here's the reason. There are 170 million Americans who use TikTok, something like 7 million businesses, tons of young people. President Biden desperately needs young people to vote for him in November. This is actually a vulnerability and Democrats also control the Senate.

So Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is a political animal the same way that President Biden is a political animal. And I just don't see those two guys agreeing that the Senate will move this bill and actually put it into place where Biden has to sign a bill that says he's going to ban TikTok unless the Chinese owners sell the company to a non-chinese entity. I would remind people as I've been trying to do all week that the main element of this bill is not to ban TikTok.

It's to get the Chinese parent company ByteDance to sell it so that the owners are not based in China. That's the real target but most of the headlines are around the ban because that would be the punishment if ByteDance does not sell TikTok. It would be banned in the United States. So I just don't see any way we're going to get there in 2024. After 2024, that might be a different story.

But we would be starting over where it would have to pass the House again. And then we'd restart the clock and if President Biden wins in November maybe he would sign it after 2024. President Trump, for his part tried to ban TikTok in 2020. But now he's changed his story and says maybe that's not such a good idea. So I think TikTok is going to be with us for a good long while.