A deal for the Chinese parent company of popular video-sharing app TikTok to sell its US operations would see the creation of a board dominated by Americans, the White House said Saturday.

“There will be seven seats on the board that controls the app in the United States, and six of those seats will be Americans,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News.

She said a deal could be signed “in the coming days.”

The United States has forcefully sought to take TikTok’s US operations out of the hands of Chinese parent company ByteDance for national security reasons.

Under President Donald Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden, the US Congress passed a law to force ByteDance to sell its US operations or face a ban of the app.

US policymakers, including in Trump’s first term, have warned that China could use TikTok to mine data from Americans or exert influence on what they see on social media.

But Trump turned to the platform, which is hugely popular with young Americans, to garner support during his ultimately successful 2024 presidential campaign.

The Republican president has repeatedly pushed off implementation of the ban while a deal has been sought.

Investors reportedly being eyed to take over the app include Oracle, the tech firm owned by Larry Ellison, one of the world’s richest people—and a major Trump supporter.

Leavitt seemed to confirm Oracle’s participation.

“The data and privacy will be led by one of America’s greatest tech companies, Oracle, and the algorithm will also be controlled by America as well,” she told Fox News.

“So all of those details have already been agreed upon. Now we just need this deal to be signed.”

Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping discussed the matter in a phone call on Friday.

Trump said that Xi “approved” the deal during the phone call but then said, “We have to get it signed.” China did not confirm any agreement.

“We’re going to have a very, very tight control,” Trump said. “There’s tremendous value with TikTok, and I’m a little prejudiced because I frankly did so well on it.”

The Wall Street Journal, quoting sources familiar with the talks, reported that the US government could receive a multi-billion-dollar fee from investors as part of the deal.

© 2025 AFP

Car seats are there for a lot: every traffic-induced meltdown, every spilled juice box, every road trip nap. Most importantly, they save lives. But while it’s tempting to treat them like any other piece of kid gear when messes strike, they’re not just another item you can toss in the wash. They’re precision-built safety devices, and one misstep can compromise the parts designed to protect your child.

This guide walks you through how to properly clean a car seat, what not to do, and when to call a professional so your child stays protected, no matter how messy the ride gets.

For more, check out our guides to the Best Car Vacuums, Best Hand Vacuums, and Best Eco-Friendly Cleaning Products. For specific baby gear recommendations, check out our guides to the Best Baby Monitors, Best Breast Pumps, Best Strollers, Best Travel Strollers, Best Bassinets, and Best Baby Carriers.

Why Proper Car Seat Cleaning Matters

A quick toss in the washing machine may seem harmless, but it can ruin a car seat: “It could degrade the harness webbing itself, so it could weaken it,” says Kyndra Webb, a child passenger safety technician instructor and member of the National Child Passenger Safety Board. A harness is the only thing between your child and physics in a car crash.

Aggressive cleaning or machine washing can also shrink or distort covers, or strip away protective coatings. “A lot of them have fire retardants,” Webb says. “The more you wash it, the more you degrade some of that safety quality.”

Even perfect cleaning techniques can be undermined by one deceptively difficult step—putting everything back together. “The biggest thing that I have seen when families come for a car seat check after they’ve washed it, especially if they bought their car seat used, is they’re not assembling it correctly again,” Webb says. A car seat may look pristine and even be properly installed, but if the harness is routed wrong or the clips aren’t in place, it’s not doing its job.

That said, the stakes are too high to wing it. By sticking to the script of proper cleaning guidelines and manufacturer instructions, your seat can be both sanitary and road-trip ready.

How to Find a Car Seat Manual

Before you even think about reaching for those cleaning supplies, break out your car seat’s manual. If you can’t find the booklet that came with the seat, you can likely find it online: Visit your car seat manufacturer’s website, search for your specific model, and look out for links labeled “Manual,” “Instructions,” or “Support.”

The cleaning guidelines are then usually found in a dedicated section of the manual. “Some car seats even have QR codes now, so you can scan the code to bring you right to their website’s FAQs and their help,” Webb says. “Sometimes it’ll even bring you to their YouTube channel.”

If all else fails, contact customer service. “A lot of the manufacturers have child passenger safety technicians on staff,” Webb says. “They know their car seats, they know their products.” They’re the experts who can provide specific guidance for your model.

EU investigations into online platforms including X and Facebook to ensure they are protecting Europeans will be completed in the “coming weeks and months,” EU digital chief Henna Virkkunen told AFP on Friday.

Several online platforms, including Chinese retailers AliExpress and Temu and social media giants Facebook, Instagram, X and TikTok, are being probed under the European Union’s landmark Digital Services Act (DSA).

The law requires the world’s largest tech firms to do more to protect consumers online and police content online.

“I’m expecting that in the coming weeks and months, we will be able to finalize many of those investigations,” Virkkunen said, adding that “these are now the first decisions we are going to make under the Digital Services Act.”

After the conclusions of the inquiries, many of which have been underway for over a year, new ones await, Virkkunen added.

“We will probably start new ones because the DSA, of course, it’s a huge legislation,” she said.

So far, the EU investigations have focused on the “transparency of these platforms, but also protection of our democratic processes, protection of minors, online shopping.”

Fines for violating DSA rules can go as high as 6% of a company’s total worldwide annual turnover.

US President Donald Trump, who has shaken up global trade by imposing tariffs on America’s trading partners, has threatened to add to levies on countries he accuses of targeting US tech companies.

Virkkunen said it was “the sovereign right of the European Union to decide about our own digital rules.”

She added that the EU would continue to enforce the DSA and Digital Markets Act (DMA) “because these are very fair and transparent legislations and rules for everybody who’s doing business and operating in the European Union.”

She also said the European Commission’s aim was “to make Europe faster and easier, simpler for the businesses.”

© 2025 AFP