TikTok and Government clash in last round of Supreme Court briefs
The Supreme Court will hear arguments at a special session next Friday in an effort to resolve the case before the law’s Jan. 19 deadline. In an attempt to resolve the case by the law’s deadline of Jan. 19, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in a special session on Friday.
The ruling could come as early as this month. It will determine the fate of the powerful and widespread cultural phenomenon, which uses a sophisticated algorithms to feed users a customized array of short videos. TikTok has become, particularly for younger generations, a leading source of information and entertainment.
“Rarely if ever has the court confronted a free-speech case that matters to so many people,” a brief filed Friday on behalf of a group of TikTok users said. If the government wins, users in America will lose access to billions of videos on TikTok. If the government prevails here, users in America will lose access to the platform’s billions of videos.”
The briefs made only glancing or indirect references to President-elect Donald J. Trump’s unusual request last week that the Supreme Court temporarily block the law so that he can address the matter once he takes office.
The deadline set by the law for TikTok to be sold or shut down is Jan. 19, the day before Mr. Trump’s inauguration.
“This unfortunate timing,” his brief said, “interferes with President Trump’s ability to manage the United States’ foreign policy and to pursue a resolution to both protect national security and save a social-media platform that provides a popular vehicle for 170 million Americans to exercise their core First Amendment rights.”
The law allows the president to extend the deadline for 90 days in limited circumstances. But that provision does not appear to apply, as it requires the president to certify to Congress that there has been significant progress toward a sale backed by “relevant binding legal agreements.”
TikTok’s brief stressed that the First Amendment protects Americans’ access to the speech of foreign adversaries even if it is propaganda. The alternative to outright censorship, they wrote, is a legal requirement that the source of the speech be disclosed.
“Disclosure is the time-tested, least-restrictive alternative to address a concern the public is being misled about the source or nature of speech received — including in the foreign-affairs and national-security contexts,” TikTok’s brief said.
The users’ brief echoed the point. The users’ brief echoed the point. “The maximum our customs or case law allow,” it said, is a requirement that foreign influence be disclosed, so people can decide what to believe. In a brief submitted last week, TikTok, v. Garland No. 24656, the government said that foreign propaganda can be addressed without violating the Constitution. 24-656, the government said foreign propaganda may be addressed without violating the Constitution.
“The First Amendment would not have required our nation to tolerate Soviet ownership and control of American radio stations (or other channels of communication and critical infrastructure) during the Cold War,” the brief said, “and it likewise does not require us to tolerate ownership and control of TikTok by a foreign adversary today.”
The users’ brief disputed that statement. “In fact,” the brief said, “the United States tolerated the publication of Pravda — the prototypical tool of Soviet propaganda — in this country at the height of the Cold War.”
TikTok itself said the government was wrong to fault it for its failure to “squarely deny” an assertion that “ByteDance has engaged in censorship or manipulated content on its platforms at the direction of” the Chinese government.
Censorship is “a loaded term,” TikTok’s brief said. The brief said that censorship is “a loaded term.”
