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WASHINGTON (NewsNation) — The Supreme Court on Friday unanimously upheld a law banning TikTok in the US by January 19 unless it is sold by Chinese parent company ByteDance.
“There is no doubt that TikTok offers to more than 170 million Americans a distinctive and expansive outlet for expression, engagement, and source of community,” the Supreme Court opinion said. “However, Congress has determined that divestment is necessary to address its well-supported national security concerns regarding TikTok’s data collection practices and relationship with a foreign adversary. For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that the challenged provisions do not violate petitioners’ First Amendment rights.”
Early in arguments that lasted more than two and a half hours, Chief Justice John Roberts identified his “main concern”: TikTok’s ownership of China-based ByteDance and the parent company’s demands to cooperate with Chinese government intelligence operations.
President Joe Biden said so this week he would not enforce a ban if it was upheld.
In a statement shortly after the Supreme Court’s decision was released, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Biden’s position on TikTok is that it should remain available to Americans, but “under American ownership or other ownership that addresses the national security concerns identified by Congress.”
“Given the sheer fact of timing, this administration recognizes that actions to implement the law must simply fall to the next administration, which takes office on Monday,” Jean-Pierre said.
President-elect Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social that the decision was expected and must be respected.
“My decision on TikTok will be made in the not-too-distant future, but I need time to review the situation,” he said. “Keep going!”
On Friday, Trump discussed TikTok, among other things, during a call with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
What’s happening with your TikTok account?
TikTok users who already have the app on their phones will continue to have access to it. However, new users will not be able to download the app and existing users will no longer be able to receive updates. That will ultimately render the app useless, the Justice Department has said in the lawsuits.
ByteDance and TikTok have said divestment is not possible and that if the ban is allowed to take effect, the app will effectively go dark.
What happens if ByteDance can’t find a buyer?
If TikTok is not sold to an approved buyer, federal law would prohibit app stores, such as those run by Apple and Google, from offering the popular app. It would also bar internet hosting services from hosting TikTok.
Why did TikTok face a ban?
President Joe Biden signed a law last April that gave ByteDance, which owns TikTok and is based in China, a Jan. 19 deadline to sell the platform to an approved buyer or face being banned in the United States
US officials argued that the vast amounts of user data that TikTok collects, including sensitive information about viewing habits, could fall into the hands of the Chinese government through coercion. They also worried that the proprietary algorithm that drives what users see on the app is vulnerable to manipulation by Chinese authorities, which could pressure ByteDance to shape content on the platform in a way that is hard to detect.
TikTok, which sued the government last year over the law, has long denied it could be used as a tool of Beijing.
The law came under a major foreign aid package called the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act.
TikTok has been fighting the law ever since.
What did Tiktok say about the ban?
TikTok and ByteDance — along with some content creators and users — argued that the law violates constitutionally protected free speech rights.
“Rarely if ever has the court confronted a free speech case that matters to so many people,” wrote lawyers for the users and content creators.
TikTok said in previous court hearings that a ban “will stifle the speech of applicants and the many Americans who use the platform to communicate about politics, commerce, the arts and other matters of public interest.”
The platform also claims that it operates separately from its Chinese parent company and will not face pressure from the US rival.
TikTok struggled with legal challenges around the world
With billions of users spanning the globe, concerns about TikTok have sparked in several countries.
The company faces outright or partial bans in at least 20 nations, The New York Times reported.
India banned the app in 2020 as tense relations with China exploded into fighting along their shared border, the Times reported. Nepal took TikTok offline for nearly a year to avoid shutting down content the government described as hate speech, according to the Times.
NewsNation’s Kellie Meyer, Safia Samee Ali and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
