China-based ByteDance and its short-video app TikTok asked an appeals court on Monday to temporarily block a law that would have given parent company ByteDance to dismantle TikTok or face a ban by Jan. 19, pending review by the US Supreme Court.
The companies filed an emergency motion in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, warning that the law would go into effect without an order and “shut down one of the nation’s most popular speech platforms — TikTok — for its more than 170 million domestic monthly users on the eve of the president’s inauguration.”
Without an injunction, TikTok could be banned in the US in six weeks, making the company far less valuable to ByteDance and its investors, and hurting businesses that rely on TikTok to drive their sales.
On Friday, a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals upheld a law requiring ByteDance to take down TikTok in the United States by early next year or face a ban in six weeks. Lawyers for the companies said the likelihood of the Supreme Court taking up the case “is high enough to warrant the necessary temporary pause to create time for further discussion of the reverse.” The companies also noted that President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to block the ban, arguing that a delay would “give the incoming administration time to determine its position — which could trigger both imminent harm and the need for a Supreme Court review.”
The Justice Department said the appeals court should immediately deny requests from ByteDance and TikTok to “maximize the time available for the Supreme Court’s consideration” of the petitions.
TikTok asked the appeals court to rule on the request by December 16.
The decision — unless the Supreme Court overturns it — puts TikTok’s fate in the hands of first-time President Joe Biden on whether to grant a 90-day January extension.
19 deadline to force the sale and then Trump taking office on January 20. But it’s not clear that ByteDance can meet the heavy burden of showing that it has made significant progress toward the divestiture required to trigger the expansion. Trump, who tried unsuccessfully to ban TikTok during his first term in 2020, said before November’s presidential election that he would not allow a ban on TikTok.
Mike Waltz, Trump’s incoming national security adviser, told Fox Business Network on Friday that Trump “wants to save TikTok. We have to allow the American people access to that app, but we also have to protect our data.”
The decision upholds legislation that would give the US government the power to ban other foreign-owned apps that could raise concerns about Americans’ data collection. In 2020, Trump also tried to ban WeChat, owned by Tencent, but was blocked by the courts.
TikTok also warned on Monday that the court order would “disrupt service to millions of TikTok users outside the United States,” saying hundreds of US service providers that maintain, distribute and update the app will not be able to provide support to TikTok. The stage starts on January 19.