A US Judge has said that the hearing over TikTok’s ban is set to take place on November 4th. This is a day after the elections.
It’s been a long road with many twists and turns. Late last month, a judge agreed to hold a hearing on whether or not the ban on TikTok is constitutional. At the heart of the case is whether or not this violates free speech protections afforded by the US constitution. Part of the ruling at the time said that Trump’s ban on the social media platform is legally blocked.
Now, we are learning that a hearing over whether or not the ban is legal is set to take place on November 4th – precisely 1 day after the US elections. From Reuters:
A U.S. judge said on Tuesday he would hold a Nov. 4 hearing on whether to allow the U.S. government to bar transactions with TikTok, a move that the Chinese-owned short video-sharing app has warned would effectively ban its use in the United States.
U.S. District Judge Carl Nichols in Washington issued a preliminary injunction on Sept. 27 that barred the U.S. Commerce Department from ordering Apple Inc and Alphabet Inc’s Google app stores to remove TikTok for download by new users.
Nichols must now decide whether to block the other aspects of the Commerce Department order set to take effect on Nov. 12. Nichols’ new hearing is scheduled for one day after the presidential election.
This is just one of many moving parts in this story. Initially, TikTok avoided the ban after getting a last minute deal between itself, Walmart, and Oracle. It was last minute because Trump rejected the Oracle TikTok deal. The new deal got Trump’s initial approval. While it did get preliminary approval, the Trump administration later raised the requirements for approval.
Another moving part in all of this is China. Since TikTok’s owner, ByteDance, is based out of China, they need approval from China before any deal can be final. The problem is that China has, on multiple occasions, expressed disapproval about the whole process.
Still, what the judge’s blocking of the Trump ban does is buy TikTok time. With the hearing set for a day after the elections, TikTok has successfully run down the clock for the current administration. Now, an interesting aspect comes into play: If Trump gets rightfully fired because of the election, will that mean this charade will finally stop with Biden? Either way, the results of the election is now an additional moving part of this story thanks to when the hearing is scheduled.
One thing is for sure, this massively huge mess of a story is only continuing.
Drew Wilson on Twitter: @icecube85 and Facebook.
