The News
Lawyers for the social media app TikTok were in federal court Monday to argue against a potential ban in the United States.
The Biden administration signed a law in April that gave TikTok until mid-January to either decouple from its Chinese owner, ByteDance, or face a ban. US lawmakers have voiced concern that Beijing could use TikTok to influence its more than 170 million users in the US, or even as an espionage tool.
In arguments Monday, TikTok’s lawyer said the law “imposes extraordinary speech prohibition based on indeterminate future risks,” and reiterated an argument made in court filings that a potential sale was “not possible” within the US’ deadline.
A decision is not expected to be made before November’s US presidential election.
SIGNALS
Next US president will likely be unable to save TikTok
If the courts uphold the law, there is little the next US president could do to save TikTok, Politico argued. Former President Donald Trump, who unsuccessfully tried to ban the app in 2020, has more recently reversed his opposition, while Vice President Kamala Harris is part of the administration that signed the bill into law, Axios noted. Her campaign has embraced TikTok as a communication tool in the lead up to November’s election, and both candidates’ campaigns invited a record number of creators to their party conventions. But even if a future President Trump stops the law’s enforcement, experts predict that app store companies and internet service providers “could still be reluctant to take on the risk of hosting TikTok,” Politico wrote.
Mounting fears in the West over China surveillance
The Justice Department and US lawmakers have focused on TikTok’s Chinese ownership as a national security threat, and the law “has become a symbol of bipartisan opposition to China,” CNN wrote. Surveillance by China is a growing concern in some Western countries, where officials have warned that they are falling behind Beijing in terms of intelligence and are more vulnerable to spying, the BBC reported. While the UK, US, and Europe have recently accused individuals with ties to China of political interference, Beijing is now directing its influence efforts to local, state, and country governments, “which are not as savvy at detecting such efforts,” experts told The New York Times.
US will have to contend with enacting ‘unpopular’ ban
Even if TikTok loses its court case, there’s a chance the company won’t comply, a former State Department case officer told The Washington Post. ByteDance has said it will resort to export-control rules to avoid selling its powerful algorithm, which could force the US to “enact an unpopular ban, or back down and risk emboldening companies to believe that the government is not as powerful as it claims,” the Post argued. And if TikTok gets banned, lawmakers’ broader concerns about national security would be better addressed through “comprehensive digital privacy legislation” similar to the EU’s GDPR, a free-expression advocate told Vox.