TikTok on Monday (Dec. 16) requested that the Supreme Court issue an emergency injunction of the U.S. law that would require the app’s owner to sell it or have it banned in the country. The company is seeking an emergency injunction pending an appeal of the law to the Supreme Court, TikTok said in a press release announcing its emergency application to that court on Monday.
It added that it was urging the court to subject the law to the same strict scrutiny it has applied to “free speech bans” and find that the law violates the First Amendment.
The TikTok ban creates a deprivation of the rights of over 170 million Americans on January 19, 2025, amounting to amass unprecedented censorship,” the statement from the company said. “Estimates suggest that small businesses on TikTok would forfeit over $1 billion in revenue and creators would face roughly $300 million in lost earnings in just one month unless the ban is halted.
President Joe Biden signed the bill into law in April, as there were fears that the TikTok app posed a national security risk. On Dec. 6, a federal appeals court ruled that law does not infringe upon the First Amendment. The three-judge panel said that the Chinese government had passed laws allowing it access to and use of data that is maintained by Chinese companies.
The TikTok said it was trying to stay the law, to allow the incoming presidential administration to offer its view on the matter, which the company said could “moot both the impending harms and the need for Supreme Court review,” it was reported on 9th December.
Citing the Dec. 6 ruling, the Republican and Democratic leaders of a House select committee said in letters on Friday (Dec. 13) to the chief executives of TikTok, Apple, and Google that Tik Tok should divest its app and that Apple and Google should prepare to delete TikTok from their app stores by Jan. 19 if the company does not sell the app.
TikTok was the third most downloaded free app in Apple’s App Store in 2024, based on a list of the 20 most downloaded apps released Monday by Apple. A year earlier, TikTok had ranked No. 5 among free iPhone apps.
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