Written by David Shepardson
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Justice Department late on Wednesday asked a U.S. appeals court to reject an emergency request by TikTok to temporarily block a law requiring Chinese parent ByteDance to pull the short-video app by Jan. 19 or face penalties. ban.
TikTok and ByteDance on Monday filed an emergency motion with the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia pending review by the US Supreme Court. They warned that without judicial action, the law “would shut down TikTok — one of the country’s most popular expression platforms — with more than 170 million domestic users per month.”
The Justice Department said the court should not delay the law's effective date, arguing that “China's continued control of TikTok constitutes an ongoing threat to national security.”
TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Justice Department said on Wednesday that if the ban goes into effect on January 19, it “will not directly prohibit the continued use of TikTok” by users who have downloaded TikTok, but it acknowledged that the effect of the ban on providing support “will ultimately be to provide support for the app.” “Not practical.”
On Friday, a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals upheld the law requiring ByteDance to divest TikTok soon in the US, which faces a ban in just six weeks.
The companies noted that President-elect Donald Trump has pledged to block the ban, arguing that the delay “will give the next administration time to determine its position.”
The decision — unless overturned by the Supreme Court — puts TikTok's fate first in the hands of President Joe Biden on whether to grant a 90-day extension to the Jan. 19 deadline to force the sale and then Trump, who takes office in January. 20.
Trump, who tried unsuccessfully to ban TikTok during his first term in 2020, said before the presidential election in November that he would not allow TikTok to be banned.
The decision upholds a law that gives the US government broad powers to block other foreign-owned apps that could raise concerns about Americans' data collection. In 2020, Trump also tried to ban Tencent-owned WeChat, but it was blocked by the courts.
