Trump asks Supreme Court to delay TikTok sales deadline

Two weeks before the Supreme Court is set to hear oral arguments on TikTok’s future, President-elect Donald Trump has asked the justices to extend a Jan. 19 deadline for the app to be sold to a new owner or face a US ban

An amicus brief filed by Trump’s nominee for attorney general, John Sauer, is asking the court to grant a stay delaying the deadline so the president-elect can work out a “negotiated solution” that would save the app.

The filing reveals Trump as someone who “alone possesses the consummate expertise in deal-making, the electoral mandate and the political will to negotiate a resolution to save the platform while addressing the national security concerns expressed by the administration.”

Trump’s brief says he “opposes banning TikTok in the United States at this time,” but does not express a view that the law requiring the sale violates the First Amendment, saying he will not rule on the merits.

Instead, Sauer’s suit asks the court to pause the deadline to allow the incoming Trump administration “to pursue a negotiated resolution that could prevent a nationwide shutdown of TikTok, thereby preserving the First Amendment rights of tens of thousands of Americans while also addressing government’s national security problems.”

TikTok, which has over 170 million US users, has sued over the law, which requires it to be sold by its current China-based owner ByteDance by January 19 or be banned in the US

A federal appeals court earlier this month rejected the company’s request for an emergency break in the deadline.

The Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case on January 10.

President Joe Biden signed the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, which was part of a massive $95 billion foreign aid package passed by Congress on April 24.

Biden and some congressional leaders argued that the ultimatum against TikTok was necessary because of security concerns surrounding ByteDance and its ties to the Chinese government.

Trump initially tried to ban TikTok during his first term, but has since reversed course, promising during the 2024 presidential campaign to “save” the app.

In Trump’s amicus brief, Sauer raised the idea of ​​social media censorship, citing Brazil’s recent month-long ban on social media platform X, the handling of the Hunter Biden laptop story and the government’s efforts to stamp out COVID-19 misinformation as incidents that should give the justices pause.

“This court should be deeply concerned about setting a precedent that could create a slippery slope against global government censorship of speech on social media,” Sauer wrote in the case. “A Western government’s power to ban an entire social media platform with more than 100 million users, at the very least, should be considered and exercised with the most extreme care – not reviewed on a ‘very expedited basis’.”

While Sauer acknowledged that TikTok could pose national security risks while remaining under ByteDance’s control, he also urged the judges to be skeptical of national security officials who, he said, “have repeatedly procured social media censorship of unfavorable content and views through a combination of pressure, coercion and deception.”

“There is a jarring parallel between the D.C. Circuit’s nearly plenary deference to national security officials calling for social media censorship and the recent, well-documented history of federal officials’ extensive involvement in social media censorship efforts targeting the speech of tens of millions of Americans,” Sauer wrote .