- Law bans TikTok if China-based ByteDance doesn’t divest
- TikTok, ByteDance and creators filed a lawsuit against U.S.
- Creators: “Government cannot ban a medium for communication”
FILE – The TikTok logo is displayed on a smartphone screen in Tokyo on Sept. 28, 2020. (AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato, File)
(NewsNation) — Time is running out for TikTok, ByteDance and content creators to file legal briefs in their counter-lawsuit against the U.S. after President Joe Biden signed a law in April that forces ByteDance to sell TikTok to an approved buyer.
The deadline for ByteDance to sell TikTok was part of a larger foreign aid package and gives the company until Jan. 19, 2025, to sell.
About a month after the legislation potentially banning the app was OK’d by the president, TikTok and ByteDance filed a lawsuit saying the move unfairly singles out the platform and is an unprecedented attack on free speech.
A group of TikTok creators did the same, writing that the law is “unconstitutionally overbroad” and lacks “any conceivable legitimate interest that would warrant shuttering an entire media platform used by millions,” according to The Hill.
While ByteDance, TikTok and creators have to file legal briefs by Thursday, the Department of Justice has until July 26.
Reply briefs are due by Aug. 15, according to Reuters. A hearing in front of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia is set for Sept. 16.
“The government cannot ban a medium for communication because it believes that medium is used to transmit foreign ‘propaganda’ or other protected content,” the creators’ lawsuit said. “Nor does the government have any actual, non-speculative evidence that banning TikTok in its current form enhances Americans’ data security, or that its ban is narrowly tailored to accomplish that objective.”
TikTok, meanwhile, argued that “qualified divestiture” is “simply not possible: not commercially, not technologically, not legally,” and it therefore would lead to a shutdown of the app in the U.S., cutting off millions of daily users, The Hill reported.
Both TikTok and the Justice Department have asked for a Dec. 6 ruling by the appeals court.
The Associated Press, Reuters and NewsNation partner The Hill contributed to this report.