Supreme Court upholds TikTok ban, as creators and communities brace for impact

The United States’ top court upheld a controversial mandate to ban one of the world’s most popular social media platforms. 

The Supreme Court today sustained a law banning TikTok unless its owner, the Chinese company ByteDance, sells it by Sunday. The ongoing political saga that touched on national security, tech overreach, foreign policy and the creator economy may have reached its apex, but TikTok still has a chance to sustain its presence.

The court determined that this law, which President Joe Biden signed in April with bipartisan support, does not violate the First Amendment, as TikTok operating entities and various platform users and creators alleged in their respective suits challenging the legislation. 

It also touched on the government’s underlying national security concerns when upholding the law, saying the decision was “decidedly content agnostic.” 

“There is no doubt that, for more than 170 million Americans, TikTok offers a distinctive and expansive outlet for expression, means of engagement, and source of community,” the court’s opinion reads. “But Congress has determined that divestiture is necessary to address its well-supported national security concerns regarding TikTok’s data collection practices and relationship with a foreign adversary.”

Ban supporters cite concerns for national security, user wellness 

Beyond free speech concerns, the response to the ban has illuminated deep divisions around how Americans view social media, multinational tech companies, the People’s Republic of China and data privacy. 

Many of the law’s proponents argued that the Chinese government could threaten US national security by using the platform to collect user data and influence content. As part of a common arrangement among China-based companies, a Chinese government-owned investment fund has a 1% stake in ByteDance’s main Chinese subsidiary.

People like Rep. Mike Gallagher, a Wisconsin Republican who co-sponsored the bill to ban TikTok in the House of Representatives, referenced the Chinese government’s reported espionage, propaganda and surveillance of journalists to justify the law.

“If TikTok continues to establish itself as the dominant news platform in America and if the algorithm remains a black box and subject to the control of ByteDance and, by extension, the Chinese Communist Party,” Gallagher said in an interview with The New York Times, “you’re placing the control of information — like what information America’s youth gets — in the hands of America’s foremost adversary.” 

TikTok, for its part, told NBC News it abides by local laws in the areas where it operates. 

Proponents of the law have also cited its harmful impact on young people, especially children barraged by algorithm-driven content.

 A study from the digital security-focused Security.org found that 50% of surveyed parents thought a federal ban would make children safer. 

While TikTok has defended its child safety protocol and tools, documents made public through a lawsuit from 14 states’ attorneys general indicated the company was aware of and not addressing issues related to the app’s impacts on children’s mental health.  

Opponents lambast economic and social impacts of TikTok restrictions

The effort to ban TikTik faced tremendous opposition from users, creators and others. One persistent theme revolved around how US-based social media and tech companies did not face comparable prohibitions despite having similar issues. 

Numerous critiques, lawsuits and studies have accused Silicon Valley juggernauts like Meta, YouTube and X of susceptibility to foreign influence campaigns, harming children’s well-being, enabling extremism, misusing user data, and facilitating authoritarianism and genocide. Yet none of these companies have been targeted with bans in the US, critics say. 

“We should be investigating all social media companies about privacy issues and bad state actors abusing platforms,” said Cynthia Choi, the executive director of the advocacy group Chinese for Affirmative Action. “Not just TikTok.”

Choi, like many Asian Americans, also criticized the law as playing into long-standing xenophobic “yellow peril” narratives, in which anything associated with East Asia is turned into a threat. 

Such narratives have enabled anti-Asian violence throughout US history, from attacks on Chinatowns during the 1800s to assaults on Asians during the Covid-19 pandemic. Choi referenced how Sen. Tom Cotton spent a child safety hearing repeatedly questioning TikTok’s Singaporean CEO Shou Chew’s citizenship.

For creators, while TikTok isn’t the biggest form of income across the field, it does provide substantial business opportunities. 

Influencers that specialize in content for their local communities previously told Technical.ly that their jobs provide unique opportunities to connect with small entrepreneurs. Plus, a lot of creators, even if they aren’t big on TikTok, said they use ByteDance-owned CapCut as an editing tool, which would also be banned under the act. 

“TikTok provides people an opportunity with a smaller following to earn money on lives and selling stuff in the shop,” said Bill Stiteler, a Pittsburgh content creator who goes by @saxboybilly18. “People make money on there in the wildest way, it’s led to sales creativity.”

Still, creators said, it’s the loss of community that they fear the most. 

The Pew Research Center found that most American adults under 30 use the platform, constituting 62% of its over 170 million US-based users. The institution also found that while most Americans believe it threatens national security, those who do tend to skew older and more conservative than the generations that use it the most. 

These critiques have already hurt the ban’s credibility in the eyes of many TikTok users, reflected in the emergence of satirical “My Chinese Spy” memes as users head to platforms like RedNote — an unofficial name for Xiaohongshu, another platform based in China. 

How the incoming Trump administration could change things

Without a sale, the ban would go into effect on Sunday, Jan. 19, and get delisted from app stores under threat of fines against their host companies.

The ban would also be implemented one day before President-elect Donald Trump officially takes office. The incoming leader has already indicated that he may abandon the Biden administration’s hardline stance. 

For instance, his amicus brief in this case asked the Supreme Court to delay the ban’s implementation date so he could negotiate a solution balancing national security issues with user rights.  

During his last term, though, Trump cited national security concerns when unsuccessfully trying to get the app banned. He has also courted support from leaders of tech companies that stand to benefit from TikTok’s exit.