In a crucial legal setback for TikTok, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia rejected the app’s emergency bid on Friday to temporarily halt a law that mandates its Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to divest from the popular video platform by January 19, or face a potential ban.
The decision means that TikTok now faces a pressing deadline and must urgently seek intervention from the U.S. Supreme Court in an attempt to prevent the law from taking effect. The companies had filed for the emergency motion earlier in the week, requesting additional time to present their case to the Supreme Court, citing the imminent threat of TikTok being banned in the United States, a market with over 170 million monthly active users.
The appeals court ruling highlighted that it had not identified any precedent where a court had intervened to delay an Act of Congress while a petition for review was pending before the Supreme Court. In the absence of a temporary block, TikTok and ByteDance face the daunting prospect of complying with the law or seeing the app removed from U.S. app stores, potentially disrupting the operations of one of the most influential social media platforms in America.
Under the new law, the U.S. government has granted itself broad powers to prohibit foreign-owned apps that it claims pose national security risks, specifically focusing on TikTok’s alleged ties to China. The Justice Department argues that the Chinese control over TikTok is a threat, particularly related to the app’s data collection practices. However, TikTok denies these claims, insisting that it stores U.S. user data on servers managed by Oracle, an American company, and asserts that content moderation decisions for U.S. users are made domestically.
With the January deadline rapidly approaching, TikTok now faces an urgent battle at the Supreme Court, as its future in the U.S. hangs in the balance.
