China-based ByteDance and its short-video app TikTok have asked an appeals court to temporarily block a law that would require the parent company to divest TikTok by January 19 or face a ban. The companies filed an emergency motion with the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, warning that without the order, the law will take effect and shut down TikTok for its 170 million domestic monthly users on the eve of a presidential inauguration.
Without the injunction, TikTok could be banned in the US in six weeks, making the company far less valuable to ByteDance and its investors, and slamming the businesses that depend on TikTok to drive their sales. The companies’ lawyers said the prospect of the Supreme Court taking the case and reversing the decision is sufficiently high to warrant a temporary pause to create time for further deliberation.
The Justice Department urged the appeals court to quickly deny the request to maximize the time available for the Supreme Court’s consideration of petitions from ByteDance and TikTok. TikTok asked the appeals court to decide on the request by December 16.
The decision puts TikTok’s fate in the hands of President-elect Joe Biden, who has yet to take office, and President Donald Trump, who has vowed to prevent a ban. Trump’s incoming national security adviser Mike Waltz said Trump wants to save TikTok, but also wants to protect American data.
The law upholds the government’s sweeping powers to ban other foreign-owned apps that could raise concerns about the collection of Americans’ data. TikTok warned that the court ruling would interrupt services for tens of millions of users outside the US, and that hundreds of US service providers would not be able to provide support for the TikTok platform starting January 19.