“President Trump takes no position on the underlying merits of this dispute. Instead, he respectfully requests that the Court consider staying the Act’s deadline for divestment of January 19, 2025, while it considers the merits of this case,” wrote attorney John Sauer, who is Trump’s pick for solicitor general.
President-elect Donald Trump has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to prevent the Biden administration from its enforcing its “TikTok ban.”
According to WHYY, the request was submitted shortly after attorneys for TikTok and the federal Department of Justices submitted opposing briefs to the court. TikTok argued that the justice should find the rule unlawful; the government, for its part, argued that TikTok continues to pose a pressing threat to national security.
John Sauer, the attorney who submitted Trump’s brief, emphasized that, at present, his client has no official position on the merits of the dispute.
“President Trump takes no position on the underlying merits of this dispute. Instead, he respectfully requests that the Court consider staying the Act’s deadline for divestment of January 19, 2025, while it considers the merits of this case,” wrote Sauer, who is Trump’s pick for solicitor general.
ABC News notes that the filing attempts to caste Trump as someone who “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.”
Trump’s brief says that, while the president-elect “opposes banning TikTok in the United States at this juncture,” he wishes to “pursue a negotiated resolution that could prevent a nationwide shutdown of TikTok, thus preserving the First Amendment rights of tens of millions of Americans.”
Sauer argued that, were the court to side with the government, it could set a chilling precedent for free speech.
“This Court should be deeply concerned about setting a precedent that could create a slippery slope toward global government censorship of social media speech,” Sauer wrote. “The power of a Western government to ban an entire social-media platform with more than 100 million users, at the very least, should be considered and exercised with the most extreme care—not reviewed on a ‘highly expedited basis.’”
Sauer urged the justices to be skeptical of national security officials, whom he says have “repeatedly procured social-media censorship of disfavored content and viewpoints through a combination of pressure, coercion, and deception.”
Sauer also took issue with lower courts’ apparent “deference” to the federal government’s position in the case.
“There is a jarring parallel between the D.C. Circuit’s near-plenary deference to national security officials calling for social-media censorship, and the recent, well-documented history of federal officials’ extensive involvement in social-media censorship efforts directed at the speech of tens of millions Americans,” Sauer said.
Sources
Trump asks Supreme Court to delay TikTok ban so he can weigh in after he takes office
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