TikTok is suing the U.S. government in federal court over the Trump Administration’s decision to ban TikTok in the U.S. market. Reports that TikTok would soon file a legal challenge to the ban were already making the rounds this weekend, ahead of TikTok’s formal announcement of the lawsuit, shared today on its company blog.
TikTok says the executive order signed by President Trump on August 6th is “without any evidence to justify such an extreme action, and without any due process.” The company says it disagrees with the characterization of TikTok as a national security threat and that the Trump administration ignored all of TikTok’s efforts to address those concerns.
Unsurprisingly, TikTok said it would have preferred to continue conversations rather than turn to litigation, but the company feels its hands are tied at this point. “With the Executive Order threatening to bring a ban on our US operations – eliminating the creation of 10,000 American jobs and irreparably harming the millions of Americans who turn to this app for entertainment, connection, and legitimate livelihoods that are vital especially during the pandemic we simply have no choice,” TikTok wrote in a statement.
TikTok also outlines the concern that the executive order bans activities that are not “an unusual and extraordinary threat,” something that’s required by the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). TikTok says that the IEEPA has been cited by the administration for justification of the ban.
The company says that it has spent nearly a year working in good faith to give the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States requested details and information about TikTok’s business information it says is being completely disregarded. Ultimately, it sounds like TikTok is claiming it has worked closely to provide the US government plenty of details on how it works to show it isn’t a threat and that all that information hasn’t been taken into account with the August 6th executive order.
TikTok may not have to actually win this latest legal challenge to remain in operation, it understands. If Trump loses the November election, the new administration could take a different tactic with regard to how it handles the TikTok situation, perhaps even rescinding the order entirely.
