TikTok is reportedly prepped to slap the US’ Trump administration with a federal lawsuit and bring the thunder on it in a US court of law. The lawsuit is set to be filed in a US District Court in California, where TikTok’s US operations are based.
According to reports, TikTok plans to argue in court that the Trump administration’s EO against it is unconstitutional and unjustified. Rendering the social media platform useless and unable to properly defend itself.
To recap, US President Donald Trump signed the EO against TikTok last week. The EO is set to into effect within the next 45 days and basically bans any US citizens and companies from conducting business with two Chinese social media apps: ByteDance’s TikTok and Tencent Holdings’ WeChat. The Trump administration has accused both apps as being a threat to US national security and is actively leaving the personal data of US citizens “exposed”.
That isn’t to say that there aren’t any alternatives for TikTok; as it stands, the app’s parent company is currently considering selling the US portion of its business to two US-based entities, Microsoft being the first one that approached it. And more recently, Twitter.
It is widely speculated that one of the primary reasons behind Trump’s attack on TikTok, in particular, is due to the fact that the app had played a pivotal role when many US citizens with less than favourable views of the man banded together and sabotaged what was supposed to be his big rally in the state of Oklahoma.
The sabotage clearly worked and attendance at the rally was said to have an attendance far less than what was forecasted, but more importantly, it showed the world just how effectively the power of social media really is.
(Source: SCMP)
