TikTok Wants Incoming Trump Admin to Review U.S. Ban

TikTok wants to put on hold a law that could ban it in the U.S.

The company wants the U.S. Supreme Court to review the law in question before it goes into effect Jan. 19, Bloomberg News reported Monday (Dec. 9), citing a court filing.

This delay will also give the new presidential administration a chance to offer up its position on the matter, something that could “moot both the impending harms and the need for Supreme Court review,” the filing said.

Pausing the implementation of the law will pose “no imminent threat to national security” or “material harm on the government,” the motion, referencing the rationale behind the ban. The government, meanwhile, asked the court to quickly deny the company’s request.

The request came days after another court ruled against TikTok’s claim that the ban would constitute a free speech violation. The appellate court found that the government was justified in its concerns that the Beijing government — TikTok is owned by China’s ByteDance — could use the app to compile information on U.S. residents.

That decision effectively cleared the way for the ban to go into effect Jan. 19, one day before Trump takes the oath of office. As Bloomberg noted, the president-elect had tried to force a sale of TikTok in his first term, but has since reversed his position and argued against the ban in an appeal to younger voters during his most recent campaign.

Meanwhile, the company’s eCommerce arm, TikTok Shop, has been enjoying strong levels of consumer spending during this holiday shopping season.

A recent report by Reuters, citing figures from data firm Facteus, shows that U.S. spending on TikTok Shop had surpassed spending on Shein and Temu in the seven days leading up to Cyber Monday. Facteus based its findings on information from 140 million consumer debit and credit cards, accounting for 7% to 10% of all U.S. spending.

TikTok pointed to the impact its ban would have on American small businesses and social media creators in court on Monday, per a CNBC report, saying these merchants would lose $1.3 billion in revenue and earnings in just one month if the app were to be shut down.

“Those numbers would only increase if the shutdown extends for more than a month,” Blake Chandlee, president of global business solutions for TikTok, said in the court filing.

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