By Kanishka Singh and Nandita Bose, Reuters
US president-elect Donald Trump. Photo: AFP / Jim Watson
President-elect Donald Trump has urged the US Supreme Court to pause implementation of a law that would ban the popular social media app TikTok or force its sale, arguing he should have time after taking office to pursue a "political resolution" to the issue.
The court is set to hear arguments in the case on 10 January.
The law would require TikTok's Chinese owner, ByteDance, to sell the platform to an American company or face a ban. The US Congress voted in April to ban it unless ByteDance sells the app by 19 January.
TikTok, which has over 170 million US users, and its parent have sought to have the law struck down.
But, if the court does not rule in their favour and no divestment occurs, the app could be effectively banned in the United States on 19 January, one day before Trump takes office.
Trump's support for TikTok is a reversal from 2020, when he tried to block the app in the United States and force its sale to American companies because of its Chinese ownership.
It also shows the significant effort by the company to forge inroads with Trump and his team during the presidential campaign.
"President Trump takes no position on the underlying merits of this dispute," said John Sauer, Trump's lawyer who is also the president-elect's pick for US solicitor general.
"Instead, he respectfully requests that the Court consider staying the Act's deadline for divestment of 19 January 2025, while it considers the merits of this case, thus permitting President Trump's incoming administration the opportunity to pursue a political resolution of the questions at issue in the case," he added.
Trump previously met with TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew in December, hours after the president-elect expressed he had a "warm spot" for the app and that he favoured allowing TikTok to keep operating in the United States for at least a little while.
The president-elect also said he had received billions of views on the social media platform during his presidential campaign.
TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The company has previously said the Justice Department has misstated its ties to China, arguing its content recommendation engine and user data are stored in the United States on cloud servers operated by Oracle Corp while content moderation decisions that affect US users are made in the United States as well.
Free speech advocates separately told the Supreme Court on Friday (local time) that the US law against TikTok evokes the censorship regimes put in place by the United States' authoritarian enemies.
The US Justice Department has argued that Chinese control of TikTok poses a continuing threat to national security, a position supported by most US lawmakers.
Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen led a coalition of 22 attorneys general on Friday in filing an amicus brief asking the Supreme Court to uphold the national TikTok divest-or-ban legislation.
- Reuters