BREAKING: Trump urges Supreme Court to pause TikTok ban

On Friday, President-elect Donald Trump filed an amicus brief in TikTok’s case before the Supreme Court looking to avoid the social media app being banned in the US. The Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in the case on January 10.

Trump’s attorney, John Sauer, wrote on behalf of Trump, "On January 20, 2025, President Trump will assume responsibility for the United States’ national security, foreign policy, and other vital executive functions. This case presents an unprecedented, novel, and difficult tension between free-speech rights on one side, and foreign policy and national-security concerns on the other. As the incoming Chief Executive, President Trump has a particularly powerful interest in and responsibility for those national-security and foreign-policy questions, and he is the right constitutional actor to resolve the dispute through political means."

The filing stated that Trump is "one of the most powerful, prolific, and influential users of social media in history," and has 14.7 million followers of his own on the platform. The platform is currently facing a ban in the country if Chinese parent company ByteDance doesn’t divest. As a user of the platform, he is able to "to evaluate TikTok’s importance as a unique medium for freedom of expression, including core political speech." The filing also noted that Trump has his own platform, Truth Social, which "gives him an in-depth perspective on the extraordinary government power attempted to be exercised in this case—the power of the federal government to effectively shut down a social-media platform favored by tens of millions of Americans, based in large part on concerns about disfavored content on that platform."

The January 19, 2025 deadline in which TikTok would be banned, which takes place one day before Trump’s inauguration, is an "unfortunate timing" that "interferes with President Trump’s ability to manage the United States’ foreign policy and to pursue a resolution to both protect national security and save a social-media platform that provides a popular vehicle for 170 million Americans to exercise their core First Amendment rights."

Trump took "no position on the merits of the dispute," but instead "urges the Court to stay the statute’s effective date to allow his incoming Administration to pursue a negotiated resolution that could prevent a nationwide shutdown of TikTok, thus preserving the First Amendment rights of tens of millions of Americans, while also addressing the government’s national security concerns."

The filing noted that the timeline in which the Supreme COurt needs to weigh the case is "highly expedited," with under a month to go. The Supreme Court "should consider staying the statutory deadline for divestment and taking time to consider the merits in the ordinary course. Such an approach would allow this Court more breathing space to consider the merits, and it would also allow President Trump’s Administration the opportunity to pursue a negotiated resolution that, if successful, would obviate the need for this Court to decide these questions."