Donald Trump has stepped in to potentially reverse a ban on TikTok in the United States in a move of major significance for the social media industry – he has 14.7million followers on the app himself…
Incoming US President Donald Trump has asked the US Supreme Court to delay a potential incoming TikTok ban so he can weigh in after he takes office – and has declared himself “one of the most powerful, prolific, and influential users of social media in history.”
In a major move that would have sent shockwaves throughout the social media industry, the United States’ number one court was set to bring to pass a law in mid-January that would have banned the China-owned app that is now dominating teenagers’ online lives.
The ban was scheduled to take effect just one day before Trump was set to take office for the second time on January 19, 2025.
In a 25-page brief filed with the court, Trump asked the nine justices for a stay on the deadline so his administration could “pursue a negotiated resolution” that would “obviate the need” for the justices to issue a ruling on the case.
The US Congress passed a bipartisan law back in April of this year, that set a nine-month deadline for the Chinese company that owns TikTok to rid itself of its interest in the app or see it banned from American app stores.
Trump’s lawyers made a filing to the court today, and said the president-elect was known for “consummate deal-making expertise.”
They appeared to be arguing that Trump could negotiate a resolution that would save TikTok from having to be banned while also addressing the US’s national security concerns.
They said Trump had the “political will” to do this.
Congress’s bill highlighted numerous national security concerns over the harvesting of US teens’ data and influence on US society.
Trump has 14.7million followers on TikTok, himself. He had seemed to support the idea of a ban on TikTok and appeared to come close to making it happen in his first term in office. But he has since appeared to have changed his mind and met with TikTok’s CEO earlier in December, being quoted as saying he had a “warm spot” in his heart for the app.
Trump could ask his Department of Justice to ignore the law passed by Congress or could try to strategically get the law’s interpretation reworked.
Meanwhile, his lawyers argue he has been given a mandate by votes to protect their right to free speech – and that this includes TikTok users.
The filing says: “Moreover, President Trump is one of the most powerful, prolific, and influential users of social media in history. Consistent with his commanding presence in this area, President Trump currently has 14.7 million followers on TikTok with whom he actively communicates, allowing him to evaluate TikTok’s importance as a unique medium for freedom of expression, including core political speech.”
25-page brief
In a 25-page brief filed with the court, Trump asked the nine justices for a stay on the deadline so his administration could “pursue a negotiated resolution” that would “obviate the need” for the justices to issue a ruling on the case, as reported by The Mirror US.
“President Trump takes no position on the underlying merits of this dispute. Instead, he respectfully requests that the Court consider staying the Act’s deadline for divestment of January 19, 2025, while it considers the merits of this case,” the brief stated. “President Trump alone possesses the consummate dealmaking expertise, the electoral mandate, and the political will to negotiate a resolution to save the platform while addressing the national security concerns expressed by the Government — concerns which President Trump himself has acknowledged.”
The filing of the brief comes two weeks before oral arguments scheduled for Jan. 10 on whether the law, which requires TikTok to divest from its China-based parent company or face a ban, unlawfully restricts speech in violation of the First Amendment. It was previously reported earlier this month that a panel of three federal judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit unanimously upheld the statute, leading TikTok to appeal the case to the Supreme Court.
At the center of the case is a law called the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act. This comes as both Democrats and Republicans have expressed concern that the Chinese government could access data about American users.
Tiktok, which operates under the parent company of ByteDance, claimed the law violated their First Amendment right. “The First Amendment exists to protect free speech in the United States,” Senior Judge Douglas Ginsburg wrote in the court’s opinion. “Here the Government acted solely to protect that freedom from a foreign adversary nation and to limit that adversary’s ability to gather data on people in the United States.”
“Consequently, TikTok’s millions of users will need to find alternative media of communication,” Ginsburg said. “That burden is attributable to the [People’s Republic of China’s] hybrid commercial threat to U.S. national security, not to the U.S. Government, which engaged with TikTok through a multi-year process in an effort to find an alternative solution.”
Trump’s vow to “save the app” is a stark reversal from the man’s previous stance when he tried to ban the app during his first term only to promise during the 2024 election cycle that he would defend the app. In April, President Joe Biden signed a law that required Bytedance to sell the app to a U.S. owner within a year or face being shut down.
One month later, the app sued the government claiming that it could not be used by Beijing to spy on or manipulate Americans. Its attorneys have accurately pointed out that the U.S. hasn’t provided evidence to show that the company handed over user data to the Chinese government, or manipulated content for Beijing’s benefit.