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Does a TikTok Ban Violate Your Constitutional Right to Free Speech?
By Movieguide® Contributor
TikTok continues its legal battle to avoid being banned in the U.S., claiming that any block against it violates the Constitution’s right to free speech.
The possibility of a TikTok ban came to a head earlier this year when the House passed a bill citing concerns that the platform and its parent company, ByteDance, were leaking U.S. information to the Chinese government. President Biden signed the Protecting Americans’ Data From Foreign Adversaries Act of 2024 into law in April.
Movieguide® reported:
The legislation, called the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, demands that TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, divest the platform. If it doesn’t within 180 days, the app would be banned in American app stores.
CNBC reports that it received bipartisan support, passing with a 352-65 vote.
Last Monday, three judges met the company in a Washington D.C. court to hear their arguments.
Andrew Pincus, lawyer for the Chinese-based company TikTok and ByteDance, said, “This law imposes extraordinary speech prohibition based on indeterminate future risks.”
He also firmly stated that the company is not owned by the Chinese government.
“The owner of TikTok is ByteDance Limited, a Cayman Islands holding company,” he said.
Regardless, the company’s Chinese ties are cause for concern.
“Department of Justice lawyer Daniel Tenny argued against TikTok’s defence that the code behind its platform is based in the United States,” the BBC reported.
“There’s really no dispute here that the recommendation engine is maintained, developed, and written by ByteDance rather than TikTok US,” he said. “It is not expression by Americans in America — it is expression by Chinese engineers in China.”
“After several hours of questioning, however, it was difficult to gauge which way the court is leaning in the high-stakes legal saga that is the most dire-yet challenge TikTok has faced,” NPR said.
Movieguide previously reported on how a ban would affect users:
If enacted, the bill would require ByteDance to “sell off TikTok if the company wanted the app to remain available in the US.”
“App store owners such as Apple and Google, along with internet-hosting companies, would be prohibited from supporting TikTok and other apps that are linked to ByteDance,” CNBC reports.
Some, including TikTok, believe that a ban would harm small businesses and content creators.
“This process was secret and the bill was jammed through for one reason: it’s a ban,” a TikTok spokesperson said. “We are hopeful that the Senate will consider the facts, listen to their constituents, and realize the impact on the economy, 7 million small businesses, and the 170 million Americans who use our service.”
As of now, TikTok will be banned on Jan. 19, 2025, unless the courts overturn it.
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Publish date : 2024-09-20 04:29:00
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