TikTok Ban Will Be Tested in Federal Appeals Court

When Donald Trump was in office, he supported a federal ban on TikTok, and the wheels were set in motion.

Even though Trump reversed his position on this, the ban was eventually passed, but now it is about to get tested.

On Monday, the federal ban went before the appeals court on the basis that it violates the First Amendment.

Test It Out

The legislation passed through Congress with no issues, having been previously supported by Trump.

Trump changed his tune as some hardcore conservatives started to speak out against the ban.

That, however, did not stop the majority of the party from supporting banning the app that is owned by a China-based company.

The company, ByteDance, says that the divestment that is being called for is not practically possible, which would mean that TikTok would no longer be accessible in the United States.

The irony in all of this is that both sides of the aisle have embraced TikTok to draw in more younger voters to their side for the election.

The company argued, “The government asks this Court to bless the most sweeping speech restriction in this country’s history — a law that singles out and shutters a speech platform used by 170 million Americans.”

Its motion continued, “The First Amendment requires this Court to examine such an extraordinary speech restriction with the utmost care and most exacting scrutiny.

“Yet Congress gave this Court almost nothing to review. Congress enacted no findings, so there is no way to know why majorities of the House and Senate decided to ban TikTok.”

The Department of Justice responded, “Given TikTok’s broad reach within the United States, the capacity for China to use TikTok’s features to achieve its overarching objective to undermine American interests creates a national-security threat of immense depth and scale.”

This has become a hot topic recently due to the large number of American social media influencers who would lose significant income if TikTok is banned.

So, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals will now hear arguments and rule on the matter, but either way, this is not the end of this debate, as the case will surely find its way to the Supreme Court.