TikTok on Monday asked the Supreme Court to step in on an emergency basis to block the federal law that would ban the popular platform in the United States unless its China-based parent company agreed to sell it.
Lawyers for the company and China-based ByteDance urged the justices to step in before the law’s Jan. 19 deadline. A similar plea was filed by content creators who rely on the platform for income and some of TikTok’s more than 170 million users in the U.S.
“A modest delay in enforcing the Act will create breathing room for this Court to conduct an orderly review and the new Administration to evaluate this matter — before this vital channel for Americans to communicate with their fellow citizens and the world is closed,” lawyers for the companies told the Supreme Court.
President-elect Donald Trump, who once supported a ban but then pledged during the campaign to “save TikTok,” said his administration would take a look at the situation.
“As you know, I have a warm spot in my heart for TikTok,” Trump said during a news conference at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida. His campaign saw the platform as a way to reach younger, less politically engaged voters.
Trump was meeting with TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew at Mar-a-Lago on Monday, according to two people familiar with the president-elect’s plans who were not authorized to speak publicly about them and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
The companies have said that a shutdown lasting just a month would cause TikTok to lose about a third of its daily users in the U.S. and significant advertising revenue.
The case could attract the court’s interest because it pits free speech rights against the government’s stated aims of protecting national security, while raising novel issues about social media platforms.
The request first goes to Chief Justice John Roberts, who oversees emergency appeals from courts in the nation’s capital. He almost certainly will seek input from all nine justices.
On Friday, a panel of federal judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit denied an emergency plea to block the law, a procedural ruling that allowed the case to move to the Supreme Court.
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