Supreme Court seems likely to uphold a federal law that could force TikTok to shut down on Jan. 19

The Supreme Court seems likely to uphold a law that would ban TikTok in the United States beginning Jan. 19 unless the popular social media program is sold by its China-based parent company. Hearing arguments Friday in a momentous clash of free speech and national security concerns, the justices seemed persuaded by arguments that the national security threat posed by the company’s connections to China override concerns about restricting the speech, either of TikTok or its 170 million users in the United States. Early in arguments that lasted more than two and a half hours, Chief Justice John Roberts identified as the “main concern” in the case TikTok’s ownership by China-based ByteDance and the parent company’s ties to Chinese government’s intelligence operations.