It’s not often that a single friend-of-the-court brief to the Supreme Court merits individual attention. Then again, it’s not often — not ever, actually — that a brief is filed like the one by President-elect Donald Trump in ‘TikTok v. Garland’…
— from an op-ed by Ruth Marcus in The Washington Post, January 3, 2025.
Like many Americans, I wouldn’t mind if TikTok disappeared off the face of the earth.
At one point in time, President Donald Trump seemed to feel the same way. But maybe for different reasons.
In my case, the silly argument that TikTok poses “serious threats to national security” is not one of my reasons. Congress passed a law last year, requiring the Chinese company ByteDance to sell TikTok to an American corporation, or be effectively shut down on January 19.
Note that date. January 19.
Supporters of the law argued that the Chinese government could be acquiring intelligence information on American citizens from ByteDance. Such crucial data could include a citizen’s email address and their preference for diet videos or dancing pets.
As everyone knows, this information is readily available to any corporation or government willing to buy it from Google, Meta, Apple, or Microsoft, among other sources. You’re the Chinese government? But you can afford it? No problem.
I mean, who are we kidding? The tech companies go to a lot of effort to collect our private data, and they should have every right to sell it to the highest bidder.
So selling TikTok to an American tech company is like picking between Mexican drug cartels. Which is really the best?
No, my dislike for TikTok is more specific. I consider it a form of animal abuse to force pets to dance.
But it appears President-elect Trump has different concerns. And those concerns are highly flexible.
TikTok and ByteDance filed a challenge to the new federal law, claiming that it violates the First Amendment right to freedom of speech. Not that the Chinese government is claiming the right to freedom of speech, which would be a ridiculous claim, considering that they have nuclear weapons. But the millions of Americans who use TikTok obviously have a right to freedom of expression, and the right to access the latest diet information. Was Congress trying to — unconstitutionally — block that right and freedom?
Needless to say, the diet industry has been holding its breath.
When Donald Trump was President, back in the summer of 2020, he issued an executive order prohibiting users from downloading the TikTok app, stating that TikTok’s “data collection threatens to allow the Chinese Communist Party access to Americans’ personal and proprietary information — potentially allowing China to track the locations of Federal employees and contractors, build dossiers of personal information for blackmail, and conduct corporate espionage.” But that order was blocked by a federal judge, who ruled that Trump had exceeded his authority. (As Presidents are known to do.)
Congress, to the rescue, with the Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, passed last April. An federal appellate court rejected TikTok’s arguments and upheld the law on December 6… and for whatever reason, the Supreme Court agree to cram an emergency appeal into their busy schedule. The hearing is scheduled for today, Friday, January 10.
The emergency might have something to do with the legal sales deadline. January 19. The day before Trump’s inauguration. Who would write such a law, with a deadline like that?
The Biden administration, which last I checked was still in office, is defending the law, which they are sort of constitutionally required to do. But TikTok has friends in high places. Very high places.
Shortly after a March 2024 meeting with Republican megadonor Jeff Yass, a major investor in ByteDance, Trump began portraying himself as the Champion of Free Speech.
Thus, the title of this humor column — “Breakfast of Champions” — and the accompanying illustration. I don’t actually know what Mr. Trump eats for breakfast, but I suspect it’s Wheaties.
“For all those that want to save TikTok in America, vote Trump,” he declared in an all-caps message on Truth Social. When he uses all caps, you can tell he really means what he says. Or else maybe had the ‘caps lock’ button on, by accident.
Although Mr. Trump is not yet President Trump, he had D. John Sauer — his pick for future Solicitor General — submit a “friend-of-the-court brief” which The Wall Street Journal referred to as “extraordinary in several ways, none of them good.”
The brief extols Donald Trump as “one of the most powerful, prolific, and influential users of social media in history. Consistent with his commanding presence in this area, President Trump currently has 14.7 million followers on TikTok with whom he actively communicates, allowing him to evaluate TikTok’s importance as a unique medium for freedom of expression, including core political speech.”
All of which is perfectly true, I suppose.
Attorney Sauer continues:
“President Trump alone possesses the consummate dealmaking expertise, the electoral mandate, and the political will to negotiate a resolution to save the platform while addressing the national security concerns expressed by the Government. Indeed, President Trump’s first Term was highlighted by a series of policy triumphs achieved through historic deals, and he has a great prospect of success in this latest national security and foreign policy endeavor.”
Can the Supreme Court kindly forget about what the federal law says, and the inappropriate January 19 deadline, and the questions about the constitutional right to freedom of speech, and all the other annoying nonsense…
And just let Trump make the goddamn deal?