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The Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case on Friday. The future of TikTok In the United States, a law can Effectively ban popular apps As soon as next week.
Protecting Americans from Applications Controlled by Foreign Adversaries Act Target TikTok will impose stiff civil penalties on app “entities” that offer the service after the January 19 deadline. One of several issues the justices considered was whether the law violated constitutional protections for free speech.
During more than two hours of arguments, the judge repeatedly asked TikTok’s lead lawyer about the social media platform’s ties to the People’s Republic of China. They appear generally unconvinced by TikTok’s main argument that the law violates the free speech rights of millions of individual users in the United States.
Still, questions remain about the president-elect Donald TrumpHe was willing to enforce the law once he took office, one day after it took effect. If Trump decides not to enforce violations, third-party service providers such as apple and Google There will be a dilemma: follow the letter of the law or trust the new administration’s assurances that they can effectively ignore the law.
“The consensus that the courts will allow the injunction to stand appears to be correct,” Cornell University law professor Gautam Hans said in a statement.
“It remains unfortunate that many judges have given credence to this law, which clearly implies a right to free speech on unspecified national security grounds,” Hans said.
TikTok’s argument
Noel Francisco, the U.S. deputy attorney general during President-elect Donald Trump’s first term, opened the hearing as TikTok’s legal representative. He echoed Trump’s wishes Court terminates effective injunctionto give Trump time to find one political resolution National security concerns over TikTok.
The judges asked Francisco questions about TikTok’s relationship with the Chinese company ByteDance, which owns the social media service, and questioned TikTok’s First Amendment argument that it violated the law.
Much of the court’s investigation focused on TikTok’s ownership structure. When Justice Samuel Alito asked Francisco if he would make the same argument if TikTok were directly owned by the Chinese government, TikTok lawyers said he would not.
But Francisco also insisted that Beijing would not force TikTok to make content decisions.
“We absolutely resist any form of content manipulation by China,” Francisco said. Court observers noted his careful use of the word “resist,” as opposed to words like “refuse.”
O’Melveny Special Counsel Jeffrey Fisher represents TikTok content creators challenging the law.
Fisher said that in the interest of national security, “Congress can prohibit Americans … from associating with terrorist organizations.” But “as long as the government doesn’t step in and say ‘national security,’ the case is over.”
“You have to dig deep into what a national security claim is,” Fisher said.
Government cases
To date, much of the argument in favor of the TikTok divestment law has centered around claims that TikTok does indeed pose a national security threat. This is the core of the argument of U.S. Deputy Attorney General Elizabeth Prelogar.
Americans using TikTok may think “they’re talking to each other,” Preloga said. But in reality, “a foreign adversary, the People’s Republic of China, is exploiting vulnerabilities in the system.”
The judges asked Prelogar how TikTok differs from other foreign-owned media outlets such as Politico and Oxford University Press.
“China is a hostile foreign state that seeks every opportunity to undermine the United States,” she said. “If it takes control of (TikTok), it is difficult to predict exactly how it will use it as a tool to harm our interests.”
“But we knew it was going to try,” Preloga said.
“What we are trying to prevent is not a specific subject, a specific point of view, but the technical capabilities of foreign adversaries to use communication channels,” Prelogar said.
As for whether the incoming Trump administration will extend the deadline before the law is enacted, Prelogar said the U.S. government has not yet taken a position on this.
“We haven’t put this into practice yet, partly because it’s simply not shown here,” Preloga said.
Trump will be inaugurated on January 20, and the divestment deadline is January 19.
As for whether President-elect Trump could choose not to enforce the law, Preloga said that “raises a tough question.”
It’s unclear when the court will rule, and China’s ByteDance will face a sweeping nationwide ban if it continues to refuse to spin off TikTok to a U.S. company.
What are the potential impacts on users?
The approximately 115 million monthly active TikTok users in the United States could face a range of scenarios, depending on when the Supreme Court rules.
If there’s no news before the law takes effect on January 19 and the ban goes into effect, users may still be able to publish or interact with the app (if they’ve already downloaded it). However, multiple legal experts said those users may not be able to update or re-download the app after that date.
Thousands of short-form video creators who make money from TikTok through ad revenue, paid partnerships, merchandise and more may need to move their operations to other platforms like YouTube or Instagram.
“Shutting down TikTok, even for a day, would be a big deal, not just for the people who create content on TikTok,” said George Wang, staff attorney at the Knight First Amendment Institute. said, and the same goes for anyone who shares or views the content,” helped write the institute’s amicus brief on the case.
“This sets a very dangerous precedent for how we regulate online speech,” Wang said.
What happens next?
It’s unclear when the Supreme Court will rule, but expedited hearings in the case have some predicting a quick ruling from the court.
Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky said the case would have a “huge impact” because TikTok has such a large user base in the United States.
“It is unprecedented for a government to ban a platform for speech, especially one used by so many people,” Chemerinsky said. “Ultimately, this is a tension between free speech issues and national security claims.”
“There are good reasons to be concerned about privacy and data collection,” Cornell’s Hans said.
“But this law specifically targets one platform, which should make us all uneasy about whether future government actions will target other speech platforms.”
