Free speech advocates: US law against TikTok resembles dictatorships

(Patria) - The US law against Chinese-owned TikTok resembles censorship regimes established by authoritarian enemies of the United States, free speech advocates told the Supreme Court on Friday, Reuters reported.

In an amicus brief, PEN America, the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, and Free Press urged the nation's highest court to strike down the federal TikTok law, either banning it or forcing its sale.

They argue that the law not only unlawfully threatens to limit Americans' access to foreign media in violation of the First Amendment to the US Constitution,
but "echoes practices long associated with repressive governments".

The report states that the Soviet Union and Chinese communists jammed Western radio broadcasts after World War II, while modern Russia and China have a range of restrictions on websites and apps, including Facebook, X, and YouTube.

TikTok and its owner ByteDance are fighting to keep the popular app online in the United States after Congress voted in April to ban it unless ByteDance sells it by January 19.

The Justice Department has stated that as a Chinese company, TikTok poses a "national security threat of immense depth and breadth" due to access to a vast amount of data on US users. S

upreme Court justices have accepted the government's argument that it is acting solely to
protect the US from a "foreign adversary" and to hinder Beijing's ability to collect data on Americans.

In their amicus brief, free speech advocates said any efforts to protect Americans' data would be best achieved through privacy laws, rather than banning a popular means of expression.

The brief stated that if successful, the US would ironically join Beijing in banning TikTok. Chinese authorities only allow a domestic version of the app, called Douyin, which is subject to strict censorship.