Jaap Arriens/AP
Weeks before the Supreme Court’s emergency session that could determine the fate of TikTok in the United States, Donald Trump on Friday issued a legal filing asking the high court to pause the law that would ban the Chinese-owned social media app if it isn’t sold by January 19.
The filing did not comment on the legal arguments of the law, which was signed under President Biden over national security concerns that have mounted in recent years. Instead, it touted Trump as “one of the most powerful, prolific, and influential users of social media in history,” noting his 14.7 million followers on TikTok. The president also echoed TikTok’s arguments that the law illegally restricts the First Amendment.
The filing marks the latest chapter in Trump’s shifting views regarding the popular app after he tried, and failed, to ban it in 2020. After meeting with TikTok’s CEO earlier this month, Trump hinted at possibly intervening before the law’s implementation, saying that he had a “warm spot” for the platform. In March, Trump experienced a similar reversal following a meeting with Jeff Yass, a conservative hedge-fund manager who happens to have a $33 billion stake in TikTok. All of this has come against the backdrop of Trump’s increasing coziness with some of tech’s most prominent billionaires.
D. John Sauer, Trump’s lawyer and nominee for solicitor general, wrote on Friday: “President Trump takes no position on the underlying merits of this dispute. Instead, he respectfully requests that the Court consider staying the Act’s deadline for divestment of January 19, 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.”
Whether the conservative Supreme Court with three Trump appointees will see the president-elect’s views as mere recommendations or as marching orders will be determined soon. As it stands now, the federal ban will go into effect next month—just one day before Trump’s inauguration, when as my colleague Pema Levy reports, an unprecedented era of political corruption will begin.
