Reid Rasner, who says he’s pulled together a $47.45 billion bid for TikTok, speaks on May 23, 2025, at Dakota State University in Madison. At left is DSU President José-Marie Griffiths. (John Hult/South Dakota Searchlight)
Excluding the money he loaned himself, Reid Rasner raised less than $35,000 for his failed attempt to unseat a U.S. senator last year.
This year, the 41-year-old Wyoming Republican says he’s assembled more than a million times that amount to buy the social media app TikTok and potentially move its operations to South Dakota.
South Dakotans following the story on his $47.45 billion bid since mid-April, through traditional media channels or on social media outlets like Instagram or TikTok, have likely seen the term “billionaire” attached to Rasner’s name.
But his background offers no definitive proof to support that descriptor. Instead, disclosures filed during his Senate campaign show a self-employed financial adviser who owns some real estate, sells used goods on eBay for a sizable portion of his income, and is more than $1 million in debt due to a loan he received from a family trust.
Even so, he’s won over South Dakota Republican Gov. Larry Rhoden, who’s sung Rasner’s praises in press releases and television appearances.
Rhoden appeared with Rasner on May 23 at Dakota State University in Madison, where Rasner said South Dakota is the “front-runner” for the U.S. headquarters of TikTok.
“South Dakota is lucky to have such a visionary governor,” Rasner said.
Meanwhile, the Cowboy State Daily news outlet in Wyoming reported earlier this month that Rasner “has maintained he would bring the company to Wyoming.” The outlet quoted Rasner saying “I’m from Wyoming and have always championed Wyoming.”
Wyoming lawmaker calls effort ‘self-promotion’
TikTok’s Chinese parent company is under congressional order to sell the app or be banned from the United States, due to concerns about the Chinese government’s potential access to Americans’ data. President Donald Trump has delayed the ban and is encouraging a sale, while reportedly considering another extension beyond Thursday’s deadline.
Rumored or confirmed bidders include Oracle and Amazon, former U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian.
South Dakota Searchlight messages sent to TikTok on its interactions with Rasner Media — or lack thereof — were not returned.
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Rhoden and his lieutenant governor are the only high-level politicians in South Dakota to have publicly voiced support for Rasner so far, but some other officials outside of the political sphere have followed the governor’s lead. The Board of Regents, South Dakota Retailers Association, and South Dakota Chamber of Commerce and Industry have each endorsed Rasner’s vision.
Rasner has gathered less support for his TikTok bid in his home state.
A spokesperson for Wyoming Republican Gov. Mark Gordon told South Dakota Searchlight that the governor wants to “respect the president’s deliberative process to procure the organization he feels is best-suited to operate the platform.”
John Bear, a Republican state lawmaker from Gillette and a leader of Wyoming’s Freedom Caucus, said he doesn’t think Rasner’s bid is legitimate.
“It seems to me that this is a publicity stunt, just like his last run for Senate was,” Bear said. “I went and listened to him speak one time, and I didn’t get a feel that he was doing anything other than self-promotion.”
Little information forthcoming on TikTok bid
Rasner calls his TikTok bid the most Trump-friendly, pointing to a post on Trump’s Truth Social as proof. In it, Trump, without offering any comment, shared a link to a story about Rasner from a site called JustTheNews.com with the headline “TikTok’s highest bidder is also its most Trumpian.”
Rasner Media, the company Rasner says will buy TikTok, was founded on Feb. 17, exactly one month after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the law forcing the social media site to be sold. Two days later, the Rasner Media website announced the $47.45 billion bid. Rasner posted his first video to his personal TikTok account in early March.
His media company’s website posted a press release in mid-April headlined “South Dakota Leaders Back Rasner Media’s TikTok Deal, Urge Trump Administration Support.”
Rasner has disclosed little about who his investors are but said during his Madison visit that he’s lined up “more than” $50 billion.
He’s also still asking for money.
Rasner’s FoundersTok website — which recently still said an American TikTok would be headquartered in Wyoming — sells hats and T-shirts, and asks people to invest in advance of the sale at differing support levels.
Pledge $12,000 a year, and you’ll be a “Founding Father” who gets content boosts, early access to new features, discounts on premium features and a blue verification badge.
“No payment will be requested until after Rasner Media acquires TikTok,” the site promises.
GET THE MORNING HEADLINES.
Rasner Media has also issued a press release about a “major financial and strategic partnership” with a company called Adaly, which was founded last year.
The press release calls Adaly “a leading organizational intelligence platform.” But in reality, Adaly appears to be in its formative stage.
A January story from a publication called Marketing Brew said Adaly was “pitching to indie agencies and brands” and had raised $1.2 million in seed funding to launch its AI marketing venture.
When reached via text message, Adaly co-founder Kyle Csik did not respond to questions and referred South Dakota Searchlight back to the Rasner Media press release on the partnership.
Rasner Media also recently announced support for its TikTok bid from “a coalition of over 50 conservative content creators with a combined audience of more than 15.5 million followers” who say they’ve had their voices silenced on the platform.
Neither the press release on the influencers’ support nor a TikTok video announcing it mention a financial commitment from the influencers.
Questions about billionaire status
When asked in Madison about the gulf between his fundraising clout on the campaign trail and the multibillion-dollar offer he’s presented for TikTok, Rasner told South Dakota Searchlight that the bid is “business, not politics,” while declining to disclose details.
Earlier, in a mid-April phone interview, Rasner said “it’s called ‘private equity’ for a reason.”
A press release on the Rasner Media website about Trump’s Truth Social post refers to Rasner as a “Wyoming billionaire,” and several media outlets have referred to him as a billionaire since. Dakota State University’s marketing office referred to him as a “Wyoming billionaire” in a press release on his visit to the school with Gov. Rhoden.
Rasner is not on the Forbes list of billionaires.
When asked in April if he is a billionaire, Rasner told South Dakota Searchlight “I guess you’ll have to get my financial statements.”
“Everything’s going to be disclosed soon, who the investors are and how much the investments are,” Rasner said. “I will certainly provide all of that very soon, as soon as we get the deal taken care of.”
U.S. Senate candidates are required to file financial disclosure statements with the Select Committee on Ethics. In one of the reports he filed during his failed Senate campaign, Rasner reported $108,000 of self-employment income from Omnivest Financial, the company name under which he offers wealth management services. He reported earning another $70,000 through eBay, an auction site on which he sells goods such as vintage police badges, cowboy boots and aluminum beach chairs under the name “Omnisellers.”
Rasner’s disclosure forms also list commercial real estate, from which he collected between $15,001 and $50,000 in rent, a mutual fund worth less than $100,000, and unimproved land in Casper, Wyoming, worth less than $15,000.
Owes more than $1 million to a family trust
Rasner additionally disclosed a liability of between $1 million and $5 million, due to a loan he received from a family trust at a rate of 5% interest over a 20-year term.
Meanwhile, his reports to the Federal Election Commission show that he loaned $1.2 million to his own Senate campaign.
A September letter from the commission to the Rasner campaign approved a request to terminate the 2024 campaign committee, but noted the campaign treasurer had failed to submit the required letter from Rasner signaling forgiveness of the loan.
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The commission asked the campaign treasurer to submit the missing information. The information has yet to be filed.
Rasner’s Senate financial disclosures divulge little about the trust that loaned him the money, listing it only as a “family trust” in Casper, Wyoming. South Dakota Searchlight found public records of trusts registered under Rasner’s name and his mother’s name, but the values of the trusts are not public records.
Both trusts are listed as owners of property in Natrona County, Wyoming, according to the county assessor’s office.
The trust under Rasner’s name owns a dental office whose address appears on his Senate financial disclosures as his rental property.
The trust under his mother’s name is listed as the owner of a handful of properties in the county. The properties include the building that once housed her former family business, Wyoming Glass, and properties owned by her deceased former husband, who was a gravel contractor.
South Dakota politicians skeptical
Multiple South Dakota state lawmakers either declined to speak on the record about Rasner, or did not return calls and texts seeking comment.
Rep. Erik Muckey, D-Sioux Falls, said he’s unfamiliar with the details of the TikTok pitch from Rasner, but said he has his doubts. Efforts to bolster employment opportunities for Dakota State graduates who’ve developed and honed high-tech skillsets are welcome, he said, but he’d want to see a firmer business plan to be convinced the Rasner deal is a real opportunity.
“Until we see an actual plan and some actual investment, I’m not holding my breath,” Muckey said.
Former longtime lawmaker Lee Schoenbeck, a Watertown Republican who retired as president pro tempore of the state Senate, told South Dakota Searchlight that his knowledge of Rasner’s TikTok bid is limited. Schoenbeck suggested that Rasner’s position as a maker of promises in the economic development sphere, however, is not a unique one in South Dakota history.
He pointed to examples including a hoped-for aquaculture facility in the city of Madison that received state assistance in 2019 but has never been constructed. While he can’t speak to Gov. Rhoden’s motivations or level of due diligence in the TikTok bid, Schoenbeck said economic development work requires a governor and his team to do the necessary homework to avoid too-good-to-be-true pitches.
“These kinds of people are all over,” Schoenbeck said.
Wyoming politicians ‘incredulous’ about Rasner claims
Rasner’s U.S. Senate campaign wasn’t his first run for public office. In the 2010s, he ran unsuccessfully for the Las Vegas City Council. He and his then-husband — they’ve since divorced — were living in the city at the time. Rasner sold real estate.
As an 18-year-old, Rasner ran unsuccessfully for city council in Casper, Wyoming, which is his hometown.
His Senate campaign website’s biography says he “landed his first job sweeping floors at Wyoming Glass” at age 13 — without mentioning that the company was his family’s business — and that he began investing at age 16.
“These formative experiences laid the groundwork for his entrepreneurial spirit and commitment to financial independence,” the website reads.
Bear, the Wyoming state lawmaker, said he hasn’t spent time looking into Rasner’s background because “he was never a serious candidate.”
In the U.S. Senate primary last year, Rasner presented himself as the most conservative option on the ballot. He said incumbent Republican Sen. John Barrasso wasn’t a strong enough supporter of Donald Trump.
Trump endorsed Barrasso, and Rasner lost by 43 points.
On the way to his Senate primary loss, Rasner was served a cease-and-desist letter by Wyoming Republican U.S. Rep. Harriet Hageman. The letter asked that he remove photos he’d taken with her from his campaign social media sites, because according to Hageman, the photos erroneously suggested she’d endorsed him. Rasner told the Cowboy State Daily it was an attempt to stifle his free speech.
A representative from Hageman’s office did not respond to Searchlight requests for comment. Barrasso’s office also did not respond.
Bryan Miller was recently elected chairman of the Wyoming Republican Party, and said he couldn’t comment for the party. That said, he personally was “not impressed” with Rasner during their interactions last year, when Miller led the Sheridan County GOP.
Miller said he asked Rasner who was funding his U.S. Senate campaign, but Rasner wouldn’t tell him.
“I said, ‘Well, because you can’t tell me, you’re not likely to ever get my personal support, or anyone else I know’s support, because we want to know where money comes from,’” Miller said.
The situation with the Hageman photograph turned Miller off, as well.
“The thing he did with Harriet, trying to get pictures, he tried to do that with me at the state convention, but I wouldn’t do it,” Miller said.
From where Democratic state Rep. Mike Yin sits, it appeared that the opposition party got “annoyed” with Rasner’s efforts on social media.
Yin said a lot of people in Wyoming were “utterly incredulous” when Rasner first announced his TikTok bid, especially after he raised so little for his U.S. Senate campaign from sources beyond his family.
“So the idea that he could convince people to give $50 billion?” Yin said. “It seems like he’s trying to raise his own profile.”
Rasner hasn’t announced his intention to challenge Wyoming’s other Republican U.S. senator, Cynthia Lummis, in 2026. Rasner has created a new fundraising committee, though, and loaned it a little more than $48,000. His disclosure forms identify it as a U.S. Senate campaign committee.
South Dakota comes along for the ride
It’s unclear how much South Dakota Gov. Larry Rhoden knows about Rasner.
Rhoden’s spokesperson, Josie Harms, confirmed that Rasner reached out to South Dakota first, not the other way around, about the TikTok bid. Rasner told South Dakota Searchlight he’d done outreach with governors from all the surrounding states.
Rhoden has since appeared on news segments with Rasner, which Rhoden has shared on his own X (formerly Twitter) page. After the press conference at Dakota State University, Rhoden said on The Scouting Report podcast that Rasner’s team is “ready to go,” but that South Dakota may need to offer incentives to data centers if it hopes to land technology companies.
Lawmakers rejected a bill that would have offered tax breaks to data centers during this winter’s session of the South Dakota Legislature. Rhoden could offer assistance in other ways without needing legislative approval, such as offering a grant or loan from the Future Fund for economic development, which is under the governor’s control.
Among Rasner’s other supporters, the Retailers Association and Chamber offered their support at the same time as Rhoden first did, in mid-April. Nathan Lukkes, head of the state Board of Regents, sent a letter of support for the Rasner bid just over a week later.
“We are ready to position South Dakota as the launchpad for the next generation of secure, ethical, and impactful digital media,” the letter reads.
David Owen, president of the South Dakota Chamber, told South Dakota Searchlight he got a call from Joe Fiala, deputy director of the Governor’s Office of Economic Development, shortly before the first press release mentioning South Dakota was issued by Rasner Media.
“It was, ‘Here’s an opportunity. You’ve got 12 hours,’” Owen said.
Owen said his organization had nothing to lose.
“What’s your risk by suggesting publicly it would be a good thing?” he said. “And if it doesn’t come about, what are you out?”
Northern State University Government Professor Jon Schaff said there could be reputational damage to the governor “if Rasner turns out to be something of an empty suit.”
“To the extent they are depicting themselves as partners rather than mere supporters-encouragers, yes, there is potential backlash,” Schaff said.
Rhoden’s spokesperson, Harms, declined to comment about Rasner’s financial disclosures, political aspirations and TikTok investors.
Rasner declined to respond directly to a dozen questions on his companies, political ambitions, investors and personal life. He sent a statement through a spokesperson that accused South Dakota Searchlight of approaching this story with a “tone and accusatory nature” that is “completely unprofessional.”
“Your biased attacks will not deter Rasner Media’s mission to free TikTok from Chinese control,” the statement said, in part.
Reid Rasner statement
In response to a dozen questions from South Dakota Searchlight about his finances, his bid for TikTok and other topics, a representative of Reid Rasner sent an emailed statement.
Here is that statement in full:
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