00:00For other creators, we're actually seeing some of them consider moving abroad,
00:02those with large international audiences.
00:04Welcome to Ms. Mojo.
00:06And today, we're breaking down the nail-biting legal saga
00:10that could see TikTok banned in the United States,
00:12and what that means for you.
00:14In fact, as we speak, Justice Department attorneys are going head-to-head
00:17with lawyers from TikTok inside the Supreme Court
00:20over a law that will ban the app nationwide.
00:24Who proposed the ban?
00:26This case is urgent with the ban set to start
00:28in just a matter of days now.
00:29After arguments yesterday, it appears the Supreme Court will uphold the ban.
00:34Owned by Chinese tech company ByteDance,
00:36the ubiquitous social network TikTok was met with a negative reception in 2020
00:40by then-President Donald Trump.
00:42Trump's successor, Joe Biden, seemingly agreed with Trump.
00:46Hey, there's a first time for everything.
00:48Biden signed the No TikTok on Government Devices Act at the end of 2022,
00:53calling on ByteDance to sell TikTok to a U.S. firm or be banned entirely.
00:58This country has never taken the step of shutting down a speech platform,
01:03much less such an important speech platform.
01:06Subsequently, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the bipartisan
01:10Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act in 2024,
01:15explicitly putting pressure on ByteDance to sell the platform by January 19, 2025.
01:21Curiously, Trump has since reversed his position,
01:24asking the Department of Justice for more time to negotiate a political solution
01:28before he retakes office.
01:30So are we supposed to ignore the fact that the ultimate parent is, in fact,
01:34subject to doing intelligence work for the Chinese government?
01:38Data privacy concerns.
01:39It is not just about potentially manipulating content, as the hypo contemplated,
01:44but about a foreign adversary actually using the information that users provide to the platform
01:51in order to engage in kind of covert operations, potentially recruitment and espionage.
01:57So why is the U.S. government so worried about an app that most of us use for watching cat videos?
02:02Politicians fear that, because TikTok is owned by a Beijing-based parent company,
02:07it could serve as an efficient pipeline to illicitly send American users' data to the
02:11Chinese government. In addition, the government has expressed concern about the potential for
02:16Chinese disinformation campaigns to gain traction via TikTok and potentially use that
02:21traction to commit election interference on American soil. Said Democratic Senator Mark
02:26Warner of Virginia, quote,
02:28It's not hard to imagine how a platform that facilitates so much commerce, political discourse
02:32and social debate could be covertly manipulated to serve the goals of an authoritarian regime.
02:38As such, the act that President Biden signed into law would target places that TikTok can
02:42be downloaded from, like the Apple App Store and Google Play. These corporations could face
02:47heavy fines if the government feels that they aren't playing ball.
02:51This is actually the core, is that this isn't just what China could do as much so as what other
02:58social media companies can do, which I've always been talking about, to which comes in Gorsuch.
03:02Gorsuch has a really technical understanding of how the TikTok algorithm works.
03:08User safety versus freedom of speech.
03:10I think what the basis of this case is really about the content versus the ownership. And
03:17the First Amendment does not apply to foreign ownership, even if the TikTok lawyers are saying
03:26that, yes, it applies to the American content creators. That's a different argument.
03:32Meanwhile, TikTok has hardly been silent in fighting back against what it claims is the
03:36tyranny of the American government. Michael Hughes, a TikTok spokesman, said in a statement
03:41that the government's efforts to ban the social media platform constituted an attack on the free
03:46speech of U.S. citizens. Noel Francisco, a lawyer for TikTok, argued that the law zeroed in on,
03:52quote, the speech itself. This feared that Americans, even if fully informed,
03:56could be persuaded by Chinese misinformation.
03:59That, however, is a decision that the First Amendment leaves to the people.
04:03Difference in kind from what we're talking about here, which is the 170 million Americans
04:08access to access to their data and ability to manipulate the psychology and opinion of those
04:16Americans. However, Supreme Court Associate Justice Elena Kagan argued that the law only
04:21applies to ByteDance itself, quote, which doesn't have First Amendment rights. Francisco warned that
04:27if the ban is allowed to go through, quote, the government really could come in and say,
04:31I'm going to shut down TikTok because it's too pro-Republican or too pro-Democrat or won't
04:36disseminate the speech I want. And that would get no First Amendment scrutiny by anybody.
04:41Is this something that actually implicates speech and forcing a parent company or a U.S.
04:47subsidiary to divest from a parent company? Or is that a secondary effect? And that's going to have
04:52a much broader impact in the future if we see this come up when it as it relates to other apps.
04:58What will happen on January 20th? It comes down to various ISPs or data storage providers.
05:04That does mean there is an option where in some cases TikTok could move the data to continue to
05:10allow people to access it potentially. But that would be quite cumbersome. And then that raises
05:15its own data security issues for for potential users. As we mentioned a bit earlier, ByteDance
05:21has until January 19th to fully divest from TikTok and sell it off to an American company.
05:27Of course, based on all available information, this is highly unlikely to actually happen.
05:32And TikTok's best chance of remaining active in the U.S. is if incoming President Donald Trump
05:37rushes to its aid. So let's say the worst-case scenario occurs and TikTok is barred from
05:42operating in the United States. There are a few possibilities as to what happens next.
05:47What this means if on January 20th they wake up and the law has gone into effect. But this does
05:53impact the American companies just like it impacts the American users. And I think we have to pay
05:59serious attention to what that means as well. Like we said, the specific wording of the act
06:03banning TikTok would require that the app be removed from digital marketplaces, meaning that
06:08new users would be unable to download it. Well, what about everybody who already has it? While it
06:14seems unlikely that the app would simply go dark at midnight on the 20th, like what happened when
06:19India banned it in 2020, TikTok would likely become buggy, glitchy and just generally difficult to use.
06:25As you still have the app, you're still getting that content on there. But over time, maybe a
06:28couple of months, I'm told by that ex-TikTok employee, it kind of becomes defunct because
06:33it's no longer getting those updates from its parent company. And these tech apps are updating
06:37all the time. You're always getting offers. Hey, do you want to update this app? You would no longer
06:41have that option. However, if you do not have TikTok at all on your phone, you would now no
06:45longer be able to download it at all. What are the influencers to do? Of course, as with any
06:50hot button issue, there are multiple sides to the to ban or not to ban conversation. But there's also
06:56a combined case that involves TikTok users, the millions of Americans who have chosen this to be
07:01their preferred platform for content creation. And could the Supreme Court rule on how the government
07:06impacts those users' choice of venue? On one hand, parents of children and teenagers have expressed
07:12support for the ban, citing their concerns about the types of content that young people are exposed
07:17to, as well as the negative effects of overuse. On the other hand, it's important to remember that
07:22we're in a new age of uncharted digital territory. Being a digital creator is a serious business.
07:28Many, many people are earning very significant levels of income. I think that if you were really
07:33to analyze the current entertainment landscape, digital creators really match up to if you were
07:37to add musicians and actors and athletes into one bucket. And so, you know, TikTok really put it in
07:45a new arena for many people to enter and gain a following. There are people who've been able to
07:49use TikTok as a career starter. Said CNN, based on a TikTok estimate, quote,
07:54Seven million U.S. small businesses that use the app stand to lose $1 billion in revenue,
07:59and around two million creators who would suffer $300 million in lost earnings in just one month
08:04if the app is banned. Creator Eli Rollo voiced her worries about what would happen if TikTok
08:10went away, saying that, quote, I think we would see an uptick in deals on Instagram, but the TikTok
08:15money is definitely the bulk of my income. I know there are folks out there that earn a living,
08:21you know, on TikTok, but it has a national security risk to it. You know, one is the data,
08:31one of the risks. The thing that I'm more concerned about is their ability to manipulate
08:36the population of the United States, especially in time of a conflict.
08:40Before we continue, be sure to subscribe to our channel and ring the bell to get notified
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08:56What happens next?
08:57They're playing a chicken game, which is they're waiting for the government to blink,
09:03hoping that the courts will blink. And if not, then they're going to unveil some sort of quick
09:08divestment strategy on January 20th. So I think that's what would happen next.
09:12And then we'd be in the next chapter.
09:14Jess Maddox, associate professor at the University of Alabama,
09:17warned that enacting a ban on TikTok could have harmful ripple effects.
09:21Maddox pointed out that while a small handful of influencers have been able to mine extreme
09:26wealth from the platform, quote, the reality is the people who are going to be most hurt by a
09:31TikTok ban are those staunchly middle class Americans who are using this for information,
09:36for entertainment, to grow their business, their following and grow their community.
09:40Certainly most creators who came up on TikTok are predominantly short form creators. Of course,
09:45there's some new names that came up through the live streaming experience as well.
09:48The short form creators are predominantly going to go over to YouTube shorts. They're
09:51going to go over to Instagram reels and to a certain extent to Snapchat as well.
09:54But I really see those three platforms being the main players in this next era of the greater
09:58economy.
09:58With the Supreme Court increasingly leaning in favor of a ban,
10:02the app's sole hope ironically appears to be President Trump.
10:05However, given that the ban is set to take effect on January 19th,
10:09one day before his inauguration, even the commander in chief's hands are tied.
10:13If TikTok influencers' worst fears come to pass,
10:16then a mass migration from TikTok to other platforms like Instagram and YouTube
10:21seems like an inevitability.
10:23What do you think will happen to TikTok? Would you be sad to see it go?
10:49Be sure to let us know in the comments below.
10:53Do you agree with our picks? Check out this other recent clip from MsMojo.
11:11And be sure to subscribe and ring the bell to be notified about our latest videos.
11:23Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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