• Governor Gavin Newsom is investigating TikTok for possible suppression of anti-Trump content.
• The probe follows TikTok's new joint venture aimed at securing US user data and avoiding a ban.
• Newsom's office claims to have confirmed instances of suppressed content critical of President Trump.
• TikTok attributes issues to a recent data center outage rather than deliberate censorship.
• The new TikTok USDS company operates with majority ownership by American firms, many aligned with Trump.

California Governor Gavin Newsom has launched an investigation into TikTok, accusing the platform of suppressing content that criticizes former President Donald Trump. This announcement comes in the wake of TikTok's recent formation of a majority US-owned joint venture, TikTok USDS, which aims to secure US data and avoid a potential ban on the app, widely used by over 200 million Americans, according to channelnewsasia and scmp.

Newsom's review, announced on social media, is intended to assess if TikTok's content moderation policies breach California law. His office reported having independently confirmed instances of the platform suppressing anti-Trump posts, which has sparked concerns among users and raised questions about censorship practices, as outlined in both indiatimes and scmp.

In response to the accusations, TikTok attributed recent technical issues to a data center outage rather than intentional censorship, stating, “It would be inaccurate to report that this is anything but the technical issues we’ve transparently confirmed.” The company noted that users may experience bugs or slower load times as a result of this outage, according to indiatimes and channelnewsasia.

The ownership structure of TikTok has changed significantly, with ByteDance retaining a minority stake of 19.9% while American investment firms, some with ties to Trump, control 80.1% of the new venture. This restructuring is intended to align with U.S. national security and privacy concerns that have grown alongside TikTok's popularity, as reported by scmp and indiatimes.