On January 18th, 2025, TikTok, a social media application used by over 170 million Americans , officially went dark in the United States of America. The platform was merged with the American platform Musical.ly in 2018, and its popularity grew exponentially during the lockdowns of the Covid-19 Pandemic.
WHen did the “ban” start?
Talks of banning the app began during President Trump’s first term, from 2016-2020. On August 6th, 2020, Trump signed an executive order stating that TikTok was a threat to national security on the grounds that the app collects “vast swaths” of user data, giving The Chinese Communist Party easy access to American information. Since the signing of this executive order, TikTok, in an ironic turn of events, was put on a timer. After the order was signed, it gave TikTok 45 days before it was banned from all government sanctioned devices to protect national security. Furthermore, the executive order gave TikTok 90 days to sell before being banned overall. Talks from various large American companies of acquiring TikTok spawned sporadically, but never came to fruition. After President Biden took office in 2021, Trump extended TikTok’s deadline to sell, and eventually talks of the app being banned sizzled out altogether.
All of this changed after March 5th, 2024, when a bill was introduced to that would institute a nationwide TikTok ban on any American server. Formally named the “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act“, the bill makes it illegal for any app that the American government deems untrustworthy to “distribute, maintain, or update” their application. During the initial talks in 2020 of the app potentially being banned, ByteDance (the parent company of TikTok Ltd. and responsible for TikTok operations in the U.S) attempted to sue the U.S Government for trying to remove the app, claiming that it was an unconstitutional violation of the first amendment of the United States Constitution.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
U.S. Const. amend. I.
The supreme court
This law worked its way through the American court system, until it eventually reached the Supreme Court. The rulings of the Supreme Court are final, as the highest court in the U.S, what they rule becomes constitutional which can only be changed through an amendment or overturning. An overturning of a law is rare, and with only 27 amendments in the history of the United States, ten of which were added at the same time. On January 17th, 2025, the Supreme Court unanimously voted that the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Applications Act should be upheld and is constitutional. Because of the degree of permanency of Supreme Court rulings, the jury being out on the constitutionality of the bill gave TikTok users across the nation hope. As a reaction to this ruling, ByteDance said that they would shut down operations of TikTok in the U.S on January 19th, but it went dark for some users as early as 9:45pm EST on January 18th.
What Happens now?
Upon the app no longer operating, many TikTok users jumped to various video sharing apps including Likee, and an app directly operated by China, called Xiaohongshu, known as Rednote in the U.S. Rednote’s direct English translation is “Little Red Book”. This refers to the Little Red Books that were published and required to be owned and carried by Chinese citizens. The book included Mao Zedong’s political philosophy, and Chinese citizens were forced to carry them during his rule and China’s Cultural Revolution. For American TikTok users, this was an act of protest. The United States government is banning TikTok on the grounds that it is a threat to national security and harvests user data, making it susceptible to the Chinese Communist Party. By downloading Rednote, Americans directly and willfully sacrificed their data to China as a means of defiance to the U.S government, and the freedom to protest is one constitutionally protected by the first amendment.
While Americans were searching for their replacement, president-elect Donald Trump was working to reverse the ban that was initially his idea. The TikTok outage was incredibly brief, lasting less than 24 hours. President Donald Trump, who was inaugurated on January 20th, 2025, signed an executive order extending the deadline of TikTok being banned or selling for 75 days, meaning that TikTok has until April 5th, 2025 to comply with the requests of the U.S government.
How do americans feel about the ban?
Across the nation, Americans have their own beliefs and ideas on what the TikTok ban truly means, and debates have spawned regarding whether or not it is more than a national security issue. While the U.S government claims they want to protect the data of Americans, the American users of TikTok understand that their data is being stolen, and are willing to make that sacrifice for the dopamine. Furthermore, arguments criticize companies such as Meta, Apple, and Google for wrongfully taking user data, the only difference being that those companies are American-owned.
One extreme view of the ban concerns media censorship, with some Americans believing that the app is the quickest form of mass communication in the U.S, and with a wide range of users, political content can be spread at lighting speeds. During his farewell speech on January 19th, 2025, former President Biden warned against the forming of an oligarchy in the United States. Those who strongly oppose the ban believe it to be a means of gaining control, and have used the attendance of Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Mark Zuckerberg at Trump’s inauguration ceremony as evidence that the ban is a power-play.
Most of the people who support the ban do not currently have TikTok installed on their phone, as many people deleted upon learning that it was a potential threat to their data. In a poll done on March 31st, 2023, only 19% of TikTok users were in favor of the ban. Supporters of the ban are putting their country first, and want it to be protected and preserved, even if it means seeing a viral video on Instagram Reels two weeks later.
Overall, the U.S TikTok ban goes deeper than 170 million people no longer being able to doomscroll. It involves political complications and conflict. It is imperative to be educated and informed about the happenings in one’s own country, and because this ban involves what has become a vice for so many Americans, now is a good time to learn. Both the official text of the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Applications Act and the Supreme Court opinion are easily accessible. It is also important to remember that laws and Supreme Court opinions set precedent for other situations, and though TikTok is directly entangled in this now, the future of other foreign apps, such Shein and Temu, could also be at jeopardy in the U.S.