TikTok could be on its last legs in the U.S.
On Friday, the Supreme Court upheld a law that bans the popular app in the U.S.
TikTok is owned by a company called ByteDance.
“ByteDance can be controlled by the Chinese government,” notes LSU law professor Del Wright. “And because of that possibility, they felt like having a foreign company with that much access to U.S. data would compromise U.S. national security.”
The Supreme Court’s ruling paves the way for the app to shut down in the U.S. as early as Sunday.
“It had a number of provisions in there that said you can delay the effective date of this,” says Wright. “There was a 90-day provision (and) a 270-day provision, but those provisions have effectively run out.”
ByteDance argued that the ban was about stifling free speech; and in a unanimous ruling, the Supreme Court rejected that.
“The Supreme Court didn’t find that it really was about speech so much as U.S. national security,” Wright says.
Last week, President Biden said he was not going to enforce the ban, essentially punting that task to his successor, Donald Trump.
Wright says regardless of what Trump does or does not do, the law is still on the books.
“The President can authorize the Department of Justice not to prosecute a law or enforce a law,” says Wright. “But that doesn’t mean other parties couldn’t force DOJ or force what the law says by lawsuits.”
The Supreme Court’s ruling, however, might not necessarily the final nail in the coffin for TikTok.
Wright says the law contains some provisions that would allow Tik Tok to continue in the U.S.
“If they found a buyer (that the U.S. deems acceptable), they can get some time to get this deal closed, which would allow TikTok to keep going,” Wright says.
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