On Monday, the Chinese-owned social media company TikTok begged the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) to delay a federal law that will ban the platform if its parent company does not sell it.
As The Hill reports, TikTok filed an emergency appeal before SCOTUS asking for a delay on the law’s implementation, which is set for January 19th. The company claims that their First Amendment rights are being violated by the law, which was passed on a bipartisan basis and signed into law by Joe Biden in April of 2024.
“The Act will shutter one of America’s most popular speech platforms the day before a presidential inauguration,” said TikTok’s lawyers in the application. “This, in turn, will silence the speech of Applicants and the many Americans who use the platform to communicate about politics, commerce, arts, and other matters of public concern.”
TikTok’s application, which automatically goes to Chief Justice John Roberts due to being an emergency appeal from within the D.C. Circuit, asks for SCOTUS to make its decision by January 6th, in order to give app stores and internet providers enough time to comply in the event that the appeal is rejected.
TikTok also enlisted a group of content creators to similarly beg the court for a block on the law taking effect, with the group of social media users also filing an emergency appeal.
“Even a temporary shutdown of TikTok will cause permanent harm to applicants — a representative group of Americans who use TikTok to speak, associate, and listen — as well as the public at large,” said the content creators’ lawyers.
TikTok, a platform for sharing short-length videos, first went viral for content featuring users lip-synching to famous songs before quickly expanding to a broader video content website. It has since become one of the most popular apps for younger Americans, particularly Generation Z.
However, it has faced widespread criticism from both parties, for different reasons. Republicans have expressed concern over its Chinese ties, as it is owned by Chinese company ByteDance, and thus represents a national security risk. Democrats have criticized the company’s poor practices in protecting users’ privacy, as well as keeping younger children off the platform.
TikTok’s latest appeal is likely to fail, as it is very rare for the Supreme Court to grant emergency relief. Lower courts have already ruled in the law’s favor, saying that it clears the “high bar” required to avoid constitutional challenges on a First Amendment basis. An appeals court ruled that concerns about TikTok’s impact on national security justified the “significant” impact that the law would have.
Although President-elect Donald Trump has suggested that he would oppose the ban on TikTok, the law will be implemented one day before he is to be sworn back into office.