Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said on Thursday he's putting together a group of investors to try to buy TikTok, a day after the House passed a bill that could force the Chinese owners of the popular app to sell the business.

The House bill would ban TikTok in the U.S. unless Bytedance sells the business within six months. Lawmakers passed the bill, citing the danger that China could potentially access data about the millions of Americans who regularly use the app.

"It's a great business and I'm going to put together a group to buy TikTok," Mnuchin said…

Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he’s interested in pulling together a group of investors to buy TikTok. 

“I think the legislation should pass and I think it should be sold,” Mnuchin told CNBC’s Squawk Box Thursday morning. “It’s a great business, and I’m going to put together a group to buy TikTok.”

“This should be owned by U.S. businesses. There’s no way that the Chinese would ever let a U.S. company own something like this in China,” Mnuchin, who served as the secretary of the treasury under former President Donald Trump from 2017 to 2021, added.

Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin is building an investor group to acquire ByteDance’s TikTok, as a bipartisan piece of legislation winding its way through Congress threatens its continued existence in the U.S.

The House of Representatives on Wednesday passed a bipartisan bill that if signed into law would force ByteDance to either divest its flagship global app or face an effective ban on TikTok within the U.S.