The White House is close to reaching a settlement with TikTok involving child privacy allegations, according to a report from ABC News. The social media platform would reportedly pay about $400 million and that money would be directed to so-called beautification efforts in Washington D.C., something President Donald Trump has been fixated on during his second term.
The allegations that TikTok illegally engaged in “massive-scale invasions of children’s privacy,” actually date to 2024 when President Joe Biden was in office. The U.S. government brought a lawsuit that said the company was collecting sensitive information about children without the consent of parents.
The settlement hasn’t been finalized, according to ABC, but could total about $400 million and be directed to a federal agency where it would be spent on projects Trump likes. Typically, money brought in from a settlement like this is spent on the victims or issues related to the harm caused. Specifically, it sounds like Trump is going to direct the money to the Department of the Interior or the Department of Commerce and have them spend it on repairs around D.C.
As part of those efforts, President Trump has pledged to clean up the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and paint it blue. The White House reportedly handed out a $6.9 million no-bid contract for the project, invoking special powers in the process to make it happen, according to the New York Times.
Trump has also been treating the White House like his own personal residence, completely destroying the East Wing and promising to build a ballroom. The ballroom has been tied up in court, given the fact that he hasn’t gone through normal channels and said it would be done with private funds. But he’s plowed ahead with construction, insisting it must be built for personal safety reasons. After Trump was apparently the target of a gunman at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, the president and his allies have claimed the ballroom is needed so that he can be secure.
As ABC notes, Trump’s apparent plan to spend big on his personal projects around DC comes as the White House’s proposed budget includes a $10 billion cut to the National Park Service for next year. The money is supposed to be diverted into something called the Presidential Capital Stewardship Program, which has been described as a slush fund for Trump to spend huge sums of money on whatever he likes involving “beautification.”
The president isn’t supposed to be allocating money to his pet projects however he likes, constitutionally speaking. Congress famously has the power of the purse, but who’s going to tell him no when Republicans control Congress? House Speaker Mike Johnson? That would be the day.
