A US appeals court on Friday set aside a mid-January deadline for a federal law requiring TikTok to be sold or banned from operating, rejecting the company’s request to stay the law until the Supreme Court reviews its challenge.
Lawyers for TikTok and its China-based parent company, ByteDance, are expected to appeal the case to the Supreme Court.
It’s unclear whether the state’s highest court will take up the case, though some legal experts say they expect the justices to consider it because of the kinds of novel questions it raises about social media, national security and the First Amendment.
TikTok is also facing a potential lifeline from president-elect Donald Trump, who promised to “save” the short-form video platform during the presidential campaign.
Lawyers for TikTok and ByteDance had requested the ruling after a three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit sided with the US government and rejected their challenge to the law.
The law, signed by US President Joe Biden earlier this year, requires ByteDance to sell TikTok to an authorized buyer or face a US ban due to national security concerns.
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The US has said it sees TikTok as a national security risk because ByteDance could be forced by Chinese authorities to hand over US users’ data or control content on the platform for Beijing’s benefit. TikTok denied those claims and pointed out that the government’s case rested on imagined future risks rather than proven facts.
In a petition filed last week, lawyers for TikTok and ByteDance asked for a “minimum delay” in the implementation of the law so that the Supreme Court can review the case and the incoming Trump administration can “decide its position” on the matter.
If the law is repealed, the two companies said the popular app will be shut down on Jan. 19, just a day before Trump takes office again. More than 170 million US users will be affected, the companies said.
The Department of Justice had opposed TikTok’s request for a temporary suspension, saying in a court filing last week that the parties had already proposed a plan that was “designed for the specific purpose” of allowing the Supreme Court to review the law before it went into effect.
The appeals court issued its decision on December 6 in the matter in accordance with that plan, said a report from the Department of Justice.
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