The US Supreme Court on Friday upheld a law that could result in TikTok being banned in the United States this Sunday.
“There is no doubt that, for more than 170 million Americans, TikTok offers a distinctive and broad outlet for expression, a means of engagement, and a source of community,” the court’s unanimous opinion reads. “But Congress has determined that divestment is necessary to address its well-founded national security concerns regarding TikTok’s data collection practices and its relationship with a foreign adversary.”
TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but the company reportedly plans to close the application for US users on Sunday, the deadline for an extension.
For more than five years, US government officials have attempted to ban or force the sale of TikTok, accusing the Chinese-owned company of sharing US user data with the Chinese government and filling feeds with pro-China propaganda. Congress and agencies like the FBI have not provided the public with much information confirming these allegations, but they have pursued a variety of different methods to ban TikTok.
In 2020, former President Donald Trump first attempted to ban TikTok through a failed executive order. Finally, President Joe Biden signed a bill into law on April 24, 2024 that required TikTok’s parent company, Byteance, to sell the app to a US owner by January 19 or remove it from US app stores. In a rush to avoid the ban, TikTok and a group of creators quickly filed lawsuits against the Department of Justice, arguing that the law, the Protecting Americans from Applications Controlled by Adversaries Act, Aliens, it violates your First Amendment rights.
In oral arguments Friday, TikTok attorney Noel Francisco and Jeffrey Fisher, who represents the creators, attempted to drive home that point. For the government, Attorney General Elizabeth Prelogar argued that the law did not violate the free speech rights of the defendants and instead separated the Bytedance app and Chinese influence.
“To be sure, the remedy that Congress and the President chose here is dramatic,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote in a concurring opinion. “I don’t know if this law will achieve its objectives. A determined foreign adversary may simply attempt to replace one lost surveillance application with another. As time passes and threats evolve, less dramatic and more effective solutions may emerge.”
In its opinion, the court cast doubt on TikTok’s central argument that the law violated the company’s free speech rights, writing that the “challenged provisions are ostensibly content-neutral.” The judges wrote that the law does not appear to regulate speech by TikTok or its creators, but instead targets the app and Bytedance’s corporate structure.
“It is not clear that the law itself directly regulates protected expressive activity or conduct with an expressive component,” the opinion reads. “And it directly regulates Bytedance Ltd. and TikTok only through divestiture requirements.”
The judges note that their decision should be seen as “narrowly focused” and applies strictly to TikTok. “TikTok’s scale and its susceptibility to control by foreign adversaries, coupled with the large amounts of sensitive data the platform collects, justify differential treatment to address the Government’s national security concerns,” the opinion reads.