TikTok files challenge to new law mandating app’s sale

Update:

• TikTok and ByteDance filed a lawsuit claiming the federal government’s demand that TikTok be sold within 270 days is both unconstitutional and impossible.
• The law will silence 170 million TikTok users on Jan. 19, 2025, the lawsuit claims.
• Congress could also force any newspaper or website to sell or shut down if the TikTok divestiture is allowed, the lawsuit claims, saying the sale is at odds with “the  Constitution’s commitment to both free speech and individual liberty.”
• TikTok worked with the U.S. government voluntarily for four years attempting to develop a framework to address any security concerns, the lawsuit alleges.

TikTok bill overview: 

• Who: President Joe Biden signed a bill requiring ByteDance to sell TikTok. 
• Why: The forced sale is an attempt to limit Chinese influence in the United States.
• Where: Biden signed the Senate bill in Washington, D.C.

(April 29, 2024)

President Joe Biden signed a bill requiring ByteDance to sell TikTok within 270 days or face a ban in the United States, Reuters reports.

The TikTok bill allows a one-time 90-day extension on the timeline if Biden can prove to Congress ByteDance has a qualified buyer in place and the parties have a legally binding sales agreement in place, Law360 writes.

Content creators who rely on the app for income are expected to challenge the bill, The Associated Press says.

“The bill would also bar the company from controlling TikTok’s secret sauce: the algorithm that feeds users videos based on their interests and has made the platform a trendsetting phenomenon,” AP reports.

TikTok ban expected to face multiple legal challenges, reports say

The Biden Administration threatened to force a TikTok sell agreement as far back as March 2023.

“For years we’ve allowed the Chinese Communist party to control one of the most popular apps in America that was dangerously shortsighted,” Reuters reports Sen. Marco Rubio, the top Republican on the Intelligence Committee, says. “A new law is going to require its Chinese owner to sell the app. This is a good move for America.”

The Chinese foreign ministry pointed to a statement it made earlier this year when the U.S. House passed the TikTok ban, saying “though the U.S. has never found any evidence of TikTok posing a threat to the U.S.’s national security, it has never stopped going after TikTok,” Reuters states.

TikTok has 170 million users in the United States. The ban comes after the Trump Administration attempted to put significant prohibitions on TikTok that a federal judge in Washington ultimately halted. 

TikTok is set to challenge the bill on First Amendment grounds, Reuters reports.

Do you have a TikTok account? Let us know in the comments.

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