Court denies TikTok's bid to pause US ban set for Jan. 19

Sabrina Willmer, Bloomberg News on Dec 13, 2024

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TikTok faces a U.S. ban next month after an appeals court declined to pause the measure, which takes effect if the popular video-sharing app isn’t sold by its China-based parent ByteDance Ltd.

The company’s request for the pause came after a federal appeals court panel in Washington upheld a law that bans the social media platform in the United States unless ByteDance divests itself of the app by Jan. 19. TikTok asked for a delay while it appeals the decision and as it waits for President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming administration to weigh in.

TikTok said that it now plans to take its case to the U.S. Supreme Court. “The voices of over 170 million Americans here in the U.S. and around the world will be silenced on January 19th, 2025 unless the TikTok ban is halted,” the company posted on X after the appeals court panel denied its request.

The appeals court has already concluded the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act “satisfies the requirements of the First Amendment under heightened scrutiny,” a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit wrote in Friday’s two-page ruling.

‘Constitutional Challenge’

TikTok can’t point to “any case in which a court, after rejecting a constitutional challenge to an act of Congress, has enjoined the act from going into effect while review is sought in the Supreme Court,” according to the order.

The company argued that a pause wouldn’t pose an “imminent threat to national security,” but that the ban would significantly harm users and the company. If the courts don’t act, TikTok will be removed from mobile app stores on Jan. 19, making it unavailable to Americans who don’t already use the platform. Eventually, current users will be unable to access the app.

In its earlier decision, the appeals panel said that the U.S. government appeared justified in its national security concerns that China could use the platform to collect data on citizens or push propaganda. It rejected the company’s argument that the law infringed on constitutional free-speech protections.

Many who use the platform for information and entertainment are hoping that Trump will come to the rescue after he voiced opposition to a ban on the campaign trail as he sought to woo younger voters. He had unsuccessfully tried to force a sale of the app during his first presidency.

‘Broad Discretion’

TikTok wrote that the Trump administration could pause enforcement of the law or “mitigate its most severe potential consequences.” The act gives the president and the attorney general “broad discretion over the timing and implementation of its provisions,” according to the company’s filing.

The Justice Department asked the court to deny the request, explaining that an “indefinite delay,” possibly lasting for more than a year, “would be especially deleterious to the government’s and the public’s interests in enforcing the Act.”