Welcome to Foreign Policy’s China Brief.
The highlights this week: The U.S. Supreme Court holds hearings on the legitimacy of the TikTok ban passed last year, the rescue of a Chinese actor kidnapped by a Myanmar gang draws attention to cross-border crime, and Chinese drone giant DJI lifts geofencing restrictions in the United States and parts of Europe.
Supreme Court Likely to Uphold TikTok Ban
The U.S. Supreme Court is holding hearings on the legitimacy of the TikTok ban passed by Congress last year on national security grounds, and all signs indicate that the court will uphold the law, closing TikTok’s last appeal.
The law, which bans the Chinese-owned app unless it is sold, passed with bipartisan support last April and takes effect on Jan. 19. China has protested the legislation—despite operating a closed social media environment within its own borders, where most global apps are banned and those that aren’t operate under tight censorship.
TikTok, which is headquartered in Singapore, has always denied that the Chinese government has any control over its business activities. But this is an unrealistic: TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, is a Chinese firm—and thus has no power to resist central government demands (either legally or practically), even beyond China’s borders.
It’s worth noting that there is no smoking gun showing direct orders from Chinese authorities to TikTok. Some research has demonstrated that the app’s algorithms favor pro-China content and mute coverage of human rights issues, as well as individual cases of discrimination. There is also substantial evidence that Chinese employees of ByteDance have accessed U.S. users’ data.
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who supported a TikTok ban but failed to implement one during his first term, did a U-turn on the app last year, largely assumed to be influenced by major Republican donor and TikTok investor Jeff Yass. But Trump’s options might be limited, given that lawmakers are likely reluctant to undo the ban.
That leaves the possibility of a deal: ideally for Trump, the sale of TikTok to one of his ideological allies. The president-elect attempted to broker a deal in 2020 for Oracle to buy TikTok, which fell through. Bloomberg reports that the Chinese government is considering a sale to X owner Elon Musk, who has been tapped for a role in the Trump administration.
TikTok has denied the Bloomberg reporting, calling it “fiction,” but the company has every reason to deny that the Chinese government holds ultimate decision-making power over its fate.
From China’s point of view, Musk acquiring TikTok—effectively putting a major source of influence in Trump’s hands—could be a bribe to the new U.S. president. Users might flee a Musk-owned TikTok, as many did from X following Trump’s election victory in November, but the platform could also be a potent propaganda outlet under new ownership.
TikTok users are furious about the U.S. ban, but a previous effort to rally supporters against the law misfired. As lawmakers were inundated with phone calls, the mood turned more sharply against the company. Now, some users have turned to two other Chinese social media apps: Xiaohongshu, which means “Little Red Book” but is rendered as “RedNote” in English, and Lemon8, which is also owned by ByteDance.
It is unlikely that these users will stick around: Both apps are subject to China’s censorship regime, which would ban most of the political, LGBTQ, or creative content that users say they value on TikTok. But the shift signals a possible future of the United States playing whack-a-mole with successful Chinese-owned apps, barring the passage of a more sweeping law.
What We’re Following
Criminal groups in Myanmar. The rescue of a young Chinese actor from a Myanmar criminal syndicate has once again brought public attention to the kidnapping of Chinese citizens by gangs based in the country. Wang Xing traveled to Thailand believing that he was being recruited for a film but was seized by armed men in the Thai border town of Mae Sot.
The actor was taken to Myanmar and forced to participate in an online operation carrying out so-called pig butchering scams. Wang’s rescue came after a campaign by his girlfriend went viral, prompting intervention by the Thai military. Myanmar gangs favor coerced Chinese labor for these operations; actors such as Wang and influencers have been targeted recently. Chinese films such as No More Bets seek to call attention to the problem.
Criminal groups in Myanmar, which are linked to both the country’s ruling military and rebel militias, have dismantled some operations along the Myanmar-China border, facing pressure from Beijing. Some gang bosses were also delivered to China, despite previously enjoying Chinese support.
That may explain the shift of operations to the Thai border, but the latest case is likely to mean that Beijing leans heavily on Bangkok to crack down on cross-border crime.
A bad sign for Taiwan? China is building landing vessels designed for an amphibious assault of the kind that would be needed for an invasion of Taiwan, Naval News reports. The ships, under construction at Guangzhou Shipyard by a military firm under direct control of the Chinese government, have long bridges for landings at rocky beaches to avoid Taiwan’s heavily defended ports.
Currently, only three to five of the landing vessels are under construction—not nearly sufficient for an invasion that could involve between 1 million and 2 million troops—but the move is still a worrying sign of China’s desire to have at least the capacity to invade Taiwan in the coming years.
FP’s Most Read This Week
- America Is Locked in a New Class War by Adam Tooze
- Why Biden’s Foreign Policy Fell Short by Kori Schake
- Why Is Trump So Obsessed With Greenland? by Christina Lu
Tech and Business
Drone geofencing lifted. In a potentially provocative move, Chinese drone giant DJI has lifted its geofencing restrictions—the built-in limits on flying drones over sensitive or dangerous sites, such as military bases and airports—in the United States and parts of Europe. Rather than a hard lock, drones will now give warnings while flying into restricted airspace.
DJI’s statement says the move intends to put more power and responsibility on users while still complying with U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and other regulations. But it is a sensitive time for Chinese technology firms in the United States, both because of the incoming Trump administration and the fallout from the Salt Typhoon hack.
A new—though likely ineffective at deterring hacking—round of sanctions over Salt Typhoon is due this week. A move like this could prompt a broader ban on Chinese drones, which are already limited in states such as Florida.
Massive trade surplus. China’s 2024 trade surplus reached nearly $1 trillion, a startling and unprecedented imbalance. This is the result of China’s sheer scale and industrialization; Chinese President Xi Jinping’s industrial policy push; and the move away from imports to production for many technologies, particularly cars.
While factory jobs remained a mainstay of the Chinese economy last year, helping to compensate for a general slowdown, overcapacity is causing economic problems at home and prompting reactions abroad.
Chinese businesses are struggling to survive as price competition forces their margins ever lower, and foreign governments are complaining about China’s supposedly unfair industrial policies. The size of the surplus is likely to add fuel to Trump’s efforts to impose heavy tariffs on China once he takes office.