Achi news desk-
TikTok and its Chinese parent company ByteDance sued in US federal court on Tuesday seeking to block a law signed by President Joe Biden that would force the divestiture of the short video app used by 170 million Americans or its prohibit
The companies filed their lawsuit in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, arguing that the law violates the US Constitution on several grounds including running afoul of the First Amendment’s free speech protections. The law, signed by Biden on April 24, gives ByteDance until January 19 to sell TikTok or face a ban.
“For the first time in history, Congress has enacted a law that subjects one particular speech platform to a permanent nationwide ban,” the companies said in the lawsuit.
The lawsuit said the diversion is “simply not possible: not commercially, not technologically, not legally. There is no question: the Act (law) will force the closure of TikTok by January 19, 2025, silencing the 170 million Americans who use the platform to communicate in ways that cannot be replicated elsewhere. “
The White House has said it wants to see Chinese ownership end on national security grounds but not a ban on TikTok. The White House declined to comment on the lawsuit. The US Department of Justice did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The lawsuit is TikTok’s latest move to stay ahead of efforts to shut it down in the US as companies like Snap SNAP.N and Meta META.O try to take advantage of TikTok’s political uncertainty to siphon advertising dollars away from them opponent.
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Spurred by concerns among US lawmakers that China could access data on Americans or spy on them with the app, the bill overwhelmingly passed in Congress just weeks after being introduced. TikTok has denied it has or would ever share US user data, accusing American lawmakers in the lawsuit of promoting “hypothetical” concerns.
The law prohibits app stores from offering TikTok and bans internet hosting services from supporting TikTok unless ByteDance removes TikTok by January 19.
The suit said the Chinese government “made it clear that it would not allow the diversion of the recommendation engine that is key to TikTok’s success in the United States.” The companies asked the D.C. Circuit to block US Attorney General Merrick Garland from enforcing the law and say “proposed injunctive relief” is needed.
According to the suit, 58% of ByteDance is owned by global institutional investors including BlackRock, General Atlantic and Susquehanna International Group, 21% by the company’s Chinese founder and 21% by employees – including about 7,000 of Americans.
Tensions over the internet and technology
The four-year battle over TikTok is a significant front in the ongoing internet and technology conflict between the US and China. In April, Apple AAPL.O said China had ordered it to remove META.O WhatsApp and Threads Meta Platforms from its App Store in China due to Chinese national security concerns.
TikTok has spent $2 billion to implement measures to protect US user data and made additional commitments in a 90-page draft National Security Agreement developed through negotiations with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), according to the legal case.
That agreement included TikTok agreeing to a “shutdown option” that would give the US government the authority to suspend TikTok in the US if it violated certain obligations, according to the suit.
In August 2022, according to the lawsuit, CFIUS stopped holding meaningful discussions about the deal, and in March 2023 CFIUS demanded that “ByteDance be required to divest TikTok’s US business.” CFIUS is an interagency committee, chaired by the US Treasury Department, that reviews foreign investments in American businesses and real estate that involve national security concerns.
In 2020, then-President Donald Trump was blocked by the courts in his attempt to ban Chinese-owned TikTok and WeChat, a unit of Tencent 0700.HK, in the United States. Trump, the Republican candidate challenging Democrat Biden in the November 5 US election, has since reversed course, saying he does not support a ban but that security concerns need to be addressed.
Biden could extend the January 19 deadline by three months if he decides ByteDance is making progress. The suit said the fact that the Biden presidential campaign continues to use TikTok “undermines the claim that the platform poses a real threat to Americans.” The Trump campaign is not using TikTok.
Many experts have questioned whether any potential buyer has the financial resources to buy TikTok and whether Chinese and US government agencies would approve a sale.
Moving TikTok’s source code to the United States “would take years for a whole new set of engineers to become familiar with,” according to the lawsuit.
–Reporting by David Shepardson; Edited by Will Dunham
