Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - Despite the Supreme Court's decision to uphold the TikTok ban, the social media giant is online once again.
Former Erie County District Attorney, now attorney for Lippes Mathias LLP, John Flynn, explains that regardless of TikTok's status, the court's decision still stands - if a social media platform poses a serious risk to national security, it will be banned.
"The Supreme Court, quite frankly, really focused on that in their decision, which, again, was unanimous. I mean, there was not one dissent. Out of nine judges, they all unanimously said that the national security threat outweighs any First Amendment, free speech, freedom of expression, rights that we Americans have," stated Flynn in an interview with WBEN.
Related
Flynn says even if TikTok remained ban, it would be extremely difficult to enforce since it's downloaded on over 170 million American phones.
"The only way you can enforce this, really, is for future people wanting to download it and use it. The way the law is written, it imposes civil penalties on companies that help ByteDance, which, again, ByteDance is a company that owns Tiktok. It imposes civil penalties on any company that helps ByteDance distribute, maintain or update the services. So you're talking Google, Apple and other app companies that facilitate TikTok, getting into the marketplace and getting on social media," stated Flynn.
During the lead-up to the ban, thousands of TikTok users flocked to RedNote, a Chinese-owned and Chinese Communist Party (CCP)-approved social media platform. Flynn says there is an argument to be made that the Trump administration could view RedNote as more of a national security threat than TikTok.
"You're kind of using a reverse psychology argument here, by saying that, 'Hey, It's actually better for Americans to go on TikTok and because the other guy is really the bad actor here. Okay, and we don't want Americans going on the other guys platform here. So let's rethink our ban on TikTok.' That's an argument that could be made. Again, I'm not saying you should make that argument. I'm just saying that that's an option out there," explained Flynn.
TikTok's U.S. servers were turned back on over the weekend after Trump promised to issue an executive order that would delay the ban of TikTok.