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Sept. 24, 2025, 3:40 PM EDTBy Julie Tsirkin, Monica Alba, Tara Prindiville and Alexandra MarquezPresident Donald Trump on Thursday is expected to sign a deal to facilitate the sale of TikTok from a Chinese-based company to a group of American investors, two senior White House officials told NBC News.Members of the Trump administration have for days signaled that a deal was being finalized between Chinese and U.S. officials.A senior White House official confirmed to NBC News on Wednesday that once the deal is implemented, TikTok’s U.S. operations would be run by a new joint-venture company. ByteDance, TikTok’s current China-based owner, will hold less than 20% of the stock of the new company, the official said.NBC News reached out to TikTok for comment.This structure will comply with a bipartisan law passed in 2024 that sought to ban TikTok if the platform wasn’t sold to U.S.-based owners this year. The app briefly shut down in the U.S. in January, just a day before Trump was inaugurated to his second term.The app came back online in the U.S. after Trump promised not to enforce the penalties against TikTok that were in the law and said he would seek to make a deal with China for the platform’s sale to the U.S.Trump has extended the deadline to avoid a TikTok ban several times this year. On Wednesday, a senior White House official said that he plans to extend the pause for another 120 days to allow time for the deal to go through.For years, technology experts and U.S. officials warned that TikTok, which has over 170 million U.S. users, was a national security risk and that ByteDance could give the Chinese government access to user data and to the app’s algorithm.During Trump’s first term, he signed an executive order in 2020 aimed at banning TikTok, but then-President Joe Biden reversed it the following year. Biden ultimately signed the bipartisan TikTok bill into law.On Wednesday, a senior White House official confirmed that as part of the deal, American users’ data will be stored in the U.S. and overseen by the software and cloud computing company Oracle. They added that the platform’s algorithm will be retrained and continuously monitored to ensure that U.S. content is free from any outside manipulation.On Saturday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News that the deal was almost over the finish line and that the “deal just needs to be signed.”She added that the deal would create a board to oversee TikTok with six seats reserved for American investors, but did not say who those American investors would be.On Sunday, Trump told Fox News in a separate interview that Oracle’s co-founder, Larry Ellison, would play a role in the deal. He also said that Michael Dell, CEO of Dell Technologies, and the Murdoch family, which owns a media empire that includes News Corp and Fox Corp, would also play a role.The president added that the other business leaders involved in the deal are “really great people, very prominent people.”“And they’re also American patriots, you know, they love this country, so I think they’re going to do a really good job,” he added.Julie TsirkinJulie Tsirkin is a correspondent covering Capitol Hill.Monica AlbaMonica Alba is a White House correspondent for NBC News.Tara PrindivilleTara Prindiville is a White House producer for NBC News.Alexandra MarquezAlexandra Marquez is a politics reporter for NBC News.

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President Donald Trump on Thursday is expected to sign a deal to facilitate the sale of TikTok from a Chinese-based company to a group of American investors, two senior White House officials told NBC News



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October 7, 2025
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Oct. 9, 2025, 5:00 AM EDTBy Jarrod BarryThere has rarely been a more confusing time to be a holiday shopper.Tariffs imposed by the Trump administration mean many imports are more expensive today than they were just a few months ago.The government shutdown and fresh warning signals in the labor market are contributing to anxiety about the economy.One way to relieve some of the uncertainty ahead of the holidays could be to buy your gifts early this year. And there are plenty of ways to do that as retailers kick off deals season.Amazon Prime’s Big Deal Days, Target’s Circle Week, Best Buy’s Techtober Sale and Walmart Deals are just some of the national shopping events underway in October for the pre-pre-holiday shopper. “I think the retailers are acknowledging that there is consumer demand to alleviate that stress and anxiety and shop earlier by launching events like Prime Big Deal Days in early October,” said Jack O’Leary, director of e-commerce strategic insights at NielsenIQ. To get a better sense of how prices are changing week by week, NBC News has teamed up with web data infrastructure firm Bright Data to track the online retail prices of around 600 items across Amazon, Best Buy, Home Depot, Walmart and Target.According to the latest data set, certain sectors are raising prices on more of their items than others. Shopping for gifts in October could mean significant savings over buying the same things in two months.It’s not all bad news. In a few departments, prices are rising less than you might expect, making these good options for last-minute shopping in December.ChocolateHigh cocoa prices forced candy makers like Hershey’s to charge more for nearly all of their chocolate this year.In July, the company announced that it would raise prices for retail customers by the “low double digits” percentages. “The increase we announced in July due to sustained, record high cocoa prices is it,” said a spokesperson for Hershey’s. “Implementation is about 90 days out from the announcement, so you’re likely seeing some of this starting to flow through. As a reminder, this does not impact Halloween seasonal candy.”Hershey’s also told analysts it expects that costs for raw cocoa, which have subsided a bit in recent weeks, will nonetheless remain relatively high into next year.In that environment, special deal days like the ones happening now could be a very good time to stock up on enough chocolate to get through to January. Clothes It would be reasonable to assume that apparel prices have soared this year. After all, the majority of clothes sold at U.S. retailers are manufactured overseas, many in countries that are caught up in a trade war with Washington.But that’s not what the data shows. NBC News’ tracker has picked up only a modest increase in retail prices since May. At Walmart, for example, less than 5% of the clothes we’re tracking are more expensive today than they were five months ago.If current trends hold, most T-shirts at Walmart won’t cost a lot more in December than they did in October.ToysFew places have been affected more by tariffs than the toy aisle. Last year, as many as 3 out of every 4 toys sold in the United States were manufactured in China. Since then, President Donald Trump’s tariffs on China have soared as high as 145% at the height of the trade war, before they settled at around 30%. The CEOs of rival toy giants Mattel and Hasbro both said this spring that their companies were working to diversify global manufacturing so that less than 40% of their toys come from China by the end of the year.But potentially not in time for the 2025 holiday season. Among the more than 11,000 products for sale on Amazon that Bright Data monitors, prices have increased for 37% of the sample’s Mattel toys, and 41% of its toys from Hasbro. Spokespeople for Amazon, Mattel and Hasbro didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.Jarrod BarryJarrod Barry is an intern with the NBC News Business Unit.Steve Kopack contributed.
September 29, 2025
Sept. 29, 2025, 1:52 PM EDTBy Angela YangA comedy festival in the capital of Saudi Arabia has become a cultural flash point as major comedians face criticism for accepting seemingly lucrative deals to perform in a country that was virtually impossible to visit until 2019 and a pariah in much of the West for its human rights record.The Riyadh Comedy Festival, which began Friday and runs through Oct. 9, features a variety of big names such as Dave Chappelle, Kevin Hart, Aziz Ansari, Pete Davidson, Andrew Schulz, Jo Koy, Bill Burr, Jessica Kirson, Jimmy Carr and Louis C.K.These comedians, most of them American, are now encountering resistance from some fans, human rights advocates and fellow comics in the industry.Marc Maron, host of the “WTF” podcast, blasted the festival in a recent stand-up clip, joking that it was easy for him to “take the high road on this one” considering he was not invited to perform.“I mean, how do you even promote that?” Maron said. “Like, ‘From the folks that brought you 9/11, two weeks of laughter in the desert. Don’t miss it.’ I mean, the same guy that’s gonna pay them is the same guy that paid that guy to bone-saw Jamal Khashoggi and put him in a f—ing suitcase.”The Saudi Embassy in Washington, D.C., declined to comment. Saudi Arabia’s General Entertainment Authority, which announced the festival in July, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.“The festival is the largest of its kind globally, bringing together a selection of award-winning comedy stars known for their outstanding performances on international stages and streaming platforms,” the Saudi Press Agency wrote in its announcement for the General Entertainment Authority. “It reflects the efforts to amplify Riyadh’s status as a leading destination for major cultural and artistic events.”Saudi Arabia, the oil-rich home of Islam’s two holiest sites, was for years among the most socially conservative nations on Earth with a morality police enforcing a strict interpretation of Shariah. In recent years under the rule of de facto leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the country expanded its cultural and political influence by diversifying its economy and investing in sports, entertainment and tourism to improve its global image. Along with this, the crown prince oversaw a sweeping crackdown on dissent — imprisoning disgruntled royals, women’s rights advocates, and reforming clerics as well as adherents to previously government-sanctioned proponents of strict Wahhabi Islam.Celebrities and influencers have often been criticized for performing in the country or participating in tourism campaigns, and FIFA drew condemnation last year for selecting Saudi Arabia to host the 2034 World Cup.Shane Gillis, who said he was offered an invite, claimed that the organizers “doubled the bag,” or the amount of money offered, after he declined to participate.“It was a significant bag, but I’d already said no,” Gillis said on his podcast. “I took a principled stand.”On TikTok and Instagram, verified accounts that appeared to belong to Turki Al-Sheikh, a royal court adviser who has emerged as a powerful figure in sports and entertainment as part of Saudi Arabia’s push into the global culture industry, posted videos of Chappelle and Hart.In a news release last week, Human Rights Watch wrote that the Saudi government is using the festival “to deflect attention from its brutal repression of free speech and other pervasive human rights violations” and called on the performers “to publicly urge Saudi authorities to free unjustly detained Saudi dissidents, journalists, and human rights activists.”The nonprofit watchdog organization noted that some of the events land on the seventh anniversary of the assassination of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, who was killed at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul by intelligence operatives with close ties to the crown prince. The festival also takes place just months after Saudi authorities executed Turki al-Jasser, a journalist known for exposing corruption within the Saudi royal family.“The seventh anniversary of Jamal Khashoggi’s brutal murder is no laughing matter,” Joey Shea, Saudi Arabia researcher at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement. “And comedians receiving hefty sums from Saudi authorities shouldn’t be silent on prohibited topics in Saudi like human rights or free speech.”Other listed performers for the festival include: Sebastian Maniscalco, Maz Jobrani, Tom Segura, Whitney Cummings, Jimeoin, Russell Peters, Andrew Santino, Bobby Lee, Chris Distefano, Mark Normand, Gabriel Iglesias, Hannibal Buress, Sam Morril, Jeff Ross, Omid Djalili, Ali Siddiq, Zarna Garg, Chris Tucker and Ben Hart.These performers did not respond to requests for comment.The Saudi government has been censured by dozens of countries, and in 2024 it was denied a second attempt at scoring a seat on the United Nations Human Rights Council. In the U.S., relatives of victims of the Sept. 11 terror attacks have accused the Saudi government of having potential ties to the attack. (A direct link has not been proven.)But it has also made significant inroads with some powerful figures in the West, most notably the Trump family. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner worked with the Saudis to secure a $2 billion investment in his firm and recently partnered with the country’s public investment fund to strike a $55 billion deal to take the video game giant Electronic Arts private. Trump has maintained a close relationship with the crown prince throughout the Saudi royal’s fraught tenure. View this post on Instagram A post shared by TURKI ALALSHIKH تركي آل الشيخ (@turki) The festival and subsequent fallout has also provided a rare window into these events and, in particular, the money and self-censorship often involved.One comedian, Atsuko Okatsuka, posted screenshots to Threads of what she said was her invite to the festival, including a section on “Content Restrictions” that prohibited the artists from performing material that “may be considered to degrade, defame, or bring into public disrepute, contempt, scandal, embarrassment, or ridicule” the country, its royal family or any religion.“A lot of the ‘you can’t say anything anymore!’ Comedians are doing the festival 😂” Okatsuka wrote. “they had to adhere to censorship rules about the types of jokes they can make.”Mike Birbiglia and Leslie Liao were among the comics who responded to her post, sharing that they had rejected the offer as well.Stavros Halkias similarly revealed in a podcast episode with Distefano, who did agree to perform, that he didn’t take the deal. Distefano told Halkias that while he “didn’t want to do it either,” his fiancée had ultimately urged him to “take that f—ing money.”At least one comedian, however, appears to have changed his mind despite initially agreeing to perform. Nimesh Patel, who was slated to get on stage Sunday, posted a TikTok video over the weekend sharing that he recently canceled his appearance after “having a change of heart.” That video has since become unavailable.“I’ll just do 40 shows that I had not planned on doing here in the perfectly clean, moral, above-everyone-else, United States of America — I’m tired just thinking about it — to make up for the lost bag,” Patel said.Meanwhile, comedian and podcaster Tim Dillon said in an episode of his podcast that he was dropped from the festival for making a joke about the country “having slaves.”“I’m gonna get fired again from people that are not even Saudis. I’m gonna get fired by people who don’t chop hands off. I’m gonna get fired by reasonable people. I’m gonna get fired by people that don’t practice Shariah law,” Dillon said. “This is the most controversial the people who fire me will ever be. Let me relish in this. Let’s take this win.”The Saudi Embassy did not immediately respond to a request for confirmation about the cancellation of Patel’s and Dillon’s shows.Angela YangAngela Yang is a culture and trends reporter for NBC News.Natasha Lebedeva contributed.
October 1, 2025
Sept. 30, 2025, 8:49 PM EDTBy Monica Alba and Raquel Coronell UribeWASHINGTON — National parks will remain partially open during the government shutdown set to begin Wednesday, according to an Interior Department contingency plan posted Tuesday evening.Open-air sites will remain open to the public, but buildings that require staffing, such as visitor centers or sites like the Washington Monument, will be closed. Health and safety will continue to be addressed for sites that remain operational, meaning restrooms will be open and trash will be collected, the Interior Department said.The contingency plans specify that park roads, lookouts, trails and open-air memorials will stay open but emergency services will be limited. The department added that if public access begins to pose a safety, health or resource protection issue, an area must close.Critical Senate vote fails as shutdown deadline looms02:02The contingency plan says that about 64% of the National Park Service workforce is set to be furloughed and that those kept on would perform “excepted” activities, such as law enforcement or emergency response, border and coastal protection and surveillance, and fire suppression and monitoring.The published plans come hours before a funding lapse across the federal government. Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought told agencies in a memo Tuesday night to begin implementing their shutdown plans.Recent shutdowns led to confusion about the public’s access to national parks. During the last shutdown, in his first term, President Donald Trump ordered parks to remain open. Trails and outdoor sites stayed open ,and some staff members stayed on to clean restrooms and empty trash cans.Still, many park employees were furloughed, resulting in trash piling up and restrooms filling up with human waste. Some parks, including California’s Joshua Tree, eventually had to close because of damage made by unsupervised visitors.That shutdown was the longest in U.S. history, lasting 34 days.During the 2013 shutdown, the park service took a different approach to park access. At the time, park gates were closed and bathrooms were locked. Trash went uncollected, and fencing went up around some sites, like the Lincoln Memorial.In both shutdowns, there was more notice about the plan, whereas the contingency plans published Tuesday night came just hours before a shutdown.The park service workforce, which could experience significant furloughs, is already more depleted than usual. The National Parks Conservation Association, an advocacy organization, estimated in July that the park service lost 24% of its permanent staff as a consequence of the Trump administration’s efforts to reduce the federal workforce through the Department of Government Efficiency.The park service reinstated a number of purged employees, however, The Associated Press reported this month.The park service did not immediately respond to a request for comment Tuesday night on the number of job cuts and how many people were rehired.The National Parks Conservation Association said Monday that the impacts of keeping parks open last time were “disastrous” and that some parks suffered damage that took months or even years to recover from.“A government shutdown would leave our parks understaffed and vulnerable, putting our most cherished places and millions of visitors at risk. If a national park has a gate or door, it must be locked until a funding deal is reached and our parks can be staffed and protected,” it said in a news release.Meanwhile, a letter signed by more than 40 former park superintendents urged Interior Secretary Doug Burgum to close parks, too, arguing that keeping them open during past shutdowns caused harm to them and jeopardized visitor safety.“If you don’t act now, history is not just doomed to repeat itself, the damage could in fact be much worse,” the letter said.Monica AlbaMonica Alba is a White House correspondent for NBC News.Raquel Coronell UribeRaquel Coronell Uribe is a breaking news reporter. 
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