President-elect Donald Trump has asked the Supreme Court to delay the impending ban on TikTok because he is preparing a “political solution.” In a legal briefing (PDF) on Friday, his lawyer said that Trump “opposes a ban on TikTok” and “seeks the opportunity to resolve the issues at stake through political means once he takes office.”
The BBC he says:
Trump had met with TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida last week. In his letter to the court on Friday, Trump said the case represents "an unprecedented, novel and difficult tension between free speech rights on the one hand and foreign policy and national security concerns on the other."
While the letter said Trump "will not take a position on the merits of the charge," it added that lifting the January 19 deadline would give him "an opportunity to pursue a political resolution" of the matter without going to court. .
Trump has publicly stated his opposition to the ban, despite supporting it in his first term as president.
"I feel good about TikTok, because I won the youth by 34 points," he claimed at a press conference earlier in December, although the majority of young voters supported his opponent, Kamala Harris. "There are those who say that TikTok has something to do with it," he added.
Earlier this month, TikTok asked the Supreme Court to block the ban, saying the law violates both the First Amendment rights and those of its 170 million American users.
George is still wondering what he is doing here….
