JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
TikTok was in federal court today, fighting for its survival. The social media company is attempting to overturn a law signed by President Biden that would ban the app by January in the U.S. unless it is sold to a non-Chinese buyer. NPR tech correspondent Bobby Allyn was in court today, and now he's here in studio. Hey, Bobby.
BOBBY ALLYN, BYLINE: Hey, Juana.
SUMMERS: Bobby, I just want to start with TikTok's fight for survival here. What did lawyers for the platform say to try to overturn this ban?
ALLYN: Yeah. Well, TikTok's legal team argued before a three-judge panel in Federal Appeals Court here in Washington, and they argued that the app is being unfairly singled out. A lawyer for the company said this is happening in two ways. First, banning the app would suppress the speech of TikTok's 170 million users in the U.S. That's, like, half the country. And secondly, TikTok may be owned by a China-based company, ByteDance, but it has a U.S. headquarters in Los Angeles. And as a U.S. corporation, TikTok U.S. has rights that would be violated by a ban, the lawyer said.
SUMMERS: OK, so that's the company's perspective. What about the Department of Justice? What was its strategy?
ALLYN: Yeah. Lawyers for the Justice Department said that China just poses too much of a threat to U.S. national security. A justice lawyer said the government worries about TikTok pushing pro-China views on TikTok to undermine American interests or even using the app to recruit spies for China.
SUMMERS: And at the front of the courtroom, a panel of three judges heard these arguments. Did you get any sort of indication about how they were feeling about them?
ALLYN: Yeah. You know, it's really hard to say. The judges drilled down pretty hard on both sides. And, you know, a key problem for the judges is not that TikTok is foreign-owned but that TikTok is owned by a foreign adversary, China. Judge Sri Srinivasan also brought up the possibility of war, right? He asked, what might happen if the U.S. goes to war with a nation that owns a social media platform? Could the U.S. not ban that? But on the other hand, the judges also agree that TikTokers and TikTok U.S. operations have free speech rights.
SUMMERS: Well, Bobby, I mean, what's really at the heart of all of this is the idea that TikTok is a threat to national security. What evidence do we have that the app is dangerous?
ALLYN: That's a big question. And the short answer, Juana, is we just don't know. The Justice Department has outlined in kind of broad terms how China is a threat and how we can't trust this authoritarian regime. But large sections of the Justice Department's legal papers are redacted because they say it includes top secret material. Not even TikTok's own lawyers have seen what's behind these blacked-out portions. So it's a big question mark.
But honestly, the judges really didn't focus too much on that today. The judges spent the majority of their time, you know, kind of debating the legal standards involved in the balance between free speech and national security - right? - trying to figure out what is the right balance to strike. Is a ban too aggressive? Is something else not aggressive enough? They're really trying to get to the bottom of this soon, and the Justice Department has asked the court for a ruling by December.
SUMMERS: Last thing, Bobby. I mean, I feel like we have just been hearing about this possible ban for years now literally. Once we have a decision from the judges, will we actually be getting any closer to an answer on whether that will actually happen?
ALLYN: Yeah. Well, either party can appeal. And that could take many months, as appeals usually do, likely pushing back the January 19 deadline. And that is when the TikTok ban under law is supposed to kick in. So it ultimately could be decided by the Supreme Court, you know, whether or not TikTok has any future in the U.S.
SUMMERS: NPR's Bobby Allyn. Thank you.
ALLYN: Thanks, Juana. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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