According to a Washington Post report, a discussion in the Oval Office about social media platform TikTok crashed into a scary match between Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Trade Advisor Peter Navarro while Donald Trump sat and watched.
One spectator described it as a “knockdown, drag-out” brawl.
The Post reports that Mnuchin was under the notion that he had persuaded Trump to allow a sale of TikTok to Microsoft, only to run into a roadblock set up by Navarro and plead for a total ban.
During the discussion, Navarro accused Mnuchin of being soft on China and the two were described as a shrinking match with each other for the president.
The Post adds the confrontation “was preceded by months of backroom deals among investors, lobbyists and executives. Many of these stakeholders long understood the critical nature of forging close ties with key figures in the Trump administration,” before. added, Trump signed an executive order Thursday ordering a closure of TikTok’s U.S. operations if a disinvestment did not occur by September.
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