To many people, the TikTok ban saga might seem practically concluded. President Donald Trump signed an executive order refusing to enforce the law behind it, and after a brief shutdown, the service remains solidly online in the US. Companies are floating a sale that could simply shuffle TikTok’s ownership, though there are few details yet on how they’d change the experience of the app (besides the replacement of its coveted algorithm, which China is unlikely to sell).

But over a week after the app’s revival, TikTok’s future is very much in doubt — and the response from Congress, which ordered its ban in the first place, is completely scrambled. Supporters of the law have quietly acquiesced to Trump’s flouting of it, despite delicate signals they’re unhappy. Opponents are content with the outcome but leery of Trump’s willingness to ignore legal precedent. And just like last week, nobody knows what happens next.

Trump swore he would save TikTok coming into office, and at a glance, his plan seemed to work. But it stands on paper-thin legal grounds, and so does his preferred long-term solution: making Chinese owner ByteDance sell a majority share and giving the US government a 50 percent stake.

While service providers like Oracle and Akamai appear to be working with the app again, Apple and Google don’t seem confident enough to return it to their app stores and risk massive fines. That’s even created an eBay market for phones that already have it downloaded. Trump’s 50 percent plan not only creates a new set of First Amendment concerns, it may fail to satisfy the law’s demands that ByteDance relinquish any “operational relationship” over the app. Either way, Trump’s order runs out in 75 days, putting even the current arrangement on a timer.

That said, it’s not yet clear who would challenge Trump’s move. Legal experts have suggested a service provider like Apple could seek to clarify its liability in the courts, or that TikTok users could file suit over concerns about privacy, though devoted users tend to want the app online. Meanwhile, Trump allies in Congress are walking a tight line: signaling they’d very much like the app meaningfully divested or banned, while stopping short of antagonizing the president.

Just prior to the inauguration, Sens. Tom Cotton (R-AR), who chairs the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and Pete Ricketts (R-NE) warned Trump (without naming him) off delaying a ban. “Now that the law has taken effect, there’s no legal basis for any kind of ‘extension’ of its effective date,” said Cotton and Ricketts.

After Trump signed the executive order seeking to halt enforcement, the law’s Republican supporters carefully balanced their responses. Post-inauguration, Ricketts spokesperson Ian Swanson told The Verge in a statement that “President Trump said he signed the executive order to ‘make a deal to protect our national security.’ Senator Ricketts agrees that protecting our national security is paramount and that can only be done by ridding TikTok of all ties with Communist China.” House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Brett Guthrie (R-KY), who voted for the divest-or-ban law, says that he supports letting Trump have “a window of opportunity to make significant progress,” but also recognizes “the confines that we have in the law,” Politico reports.

Trump views himself as a China hawk, but his vague sale plans — perhaps involving billionaire buddies Elon Musk or Larry Ellison or other parties like Perplexity AI — don’t offer much detail about lessening ByteDance’s practical access to TikTok. It’s also unclear how the partial government ownership would work. While the US government has a stake in some private entities, like congressionally founded financial institutions Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, owning a speech platform would pose far greater challenges.

Lawmakers have always maintained that they wanted a divestment instead of a TikTok shutdown, and now that ByteDance called their bluff, some are taking a pragmatic stance. But if the 75-day clock runs out or Trump puts forward what looks like a sham deal, they may have to reevaluate letting the law’s enforcement slide. “If this leads to a deal, that’s great,” says Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chair and TikTok hawk Mark Warner (D-VA). “What I’m not great with, and I think a lot of my Republican colleagues agree, is if we allow this national security threat to go unfettered or somehow for President Trump to completely ignore the law of the land.”

Some members of Congress who oppose the ban, conversely, are skeptical Trump’s measures can hold it off. “Right now, President Trump is unilaterally ignoring the law, and his current proposals to keep TikTok online are unserious,” Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA) says in a statement. Markey voted for the larger foreign aid package that included the divest-or-ban bill, but later wrote an amicus brief to the Supreme Court alongside Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) in support of TikTok. He later sponsored a bill to extend the deadline for a sale of the app. “We need a legally sound way for TikTok to remain online.”

Khanna, who is leading a bill with Paul to repeal the ban altogether, was slightly more supportive of Trump’s effort. “The president’s executive order is necessary while we find a solution that protects Americans’ data and doesn’t hurt ordinary people,” he says in a statement. “It could face challenges, which is why it’s also important for Congress to pass my bill with Sen. Rand Paul to repeal the ban.”

And groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Knight First Amendment Institute, which advocated at every turn against the divest-or-ban law, now find themselves speaking out against Trump’s method of evading it.

“We believe the TikTok ban is unconstitutional, so we urged Congress not to pass it, President Biden not to sign it, and the Supreme Court to overturn it,” EFF Civil Liberties Director David Greene says in a statement. “We also believe it’s unconstitutional to ignore a law passed by Congress, signed by the President, and upheld by the Supreme Court.” On top of that, Greene says he’s concerned Trump will use the sale to reward political allies. “There are no winners here, unless Congress repeals this law.”

And even if nobody stops Trump’s gambit, TikTok isn’t safe. The app may owe its resurrection to Trump’s favor — TikTok certainly thinks so, since it implemented app pop-ups thanking him by name. Now, however, it’s dependent on his continued grace. “President Trump’s executive order doesn’t save TikTok,” says Knight’s Ramya Krishnan, a senior staff attorney. “It just makes the app entirely dependent on his whims and consolidates his power over the digital public sphere.”