The popular social media platform, TikTok, has been under fire in past years as the Supreme Court of the United States has been trying to put forth a ban. During Trump’s first presidency in 2020, he signed an executive order to enforce a TikTok ban. Former President Joe Biden later signed a bipartisan bill, which included signing a provision for a potential ban, back in April of 2024. The ban was to take effect on January 19th, 2025. Ever since this provision was signed, ByteDance and TikTok have been in a back-and-forth legal battle for the platform to remain in the US. In January 2025, CEO of ByteDance and TikTok, Shou Zi Chew, took the case back to court, claiming that this ban violated the first amendment of the United States Constitution. The Supreme Court upheld their previous sale-or-ban decision by January 17th, 2025. Around 9 pm on January 18th, TikTok was seemingly gone in the United States.
Upon opening the app, the night before the ban was supposed to happen, a pop-up explains that the platform is no longer available for American users and prompts the user to close the app. The original speculation was that anybody with the app pre-installed would still be able to use TikTok, but future updates would not be given to the US. Once the ban was put into effect, the app was removed from app stores. Some users of the platform abandoned their accounts and moved to different TikTok-like platforms. The so-called “TikTok Refugees” found a new home on Instagram Reels or RedNote (Xiaohongshu) because of their similarity to the short clip style of TikTok. Hernando High School, sophomore Emma Pugh commented, “TikTok made COVID enjoyable. A big part of my childhood from the age of 11-14 was TikTok, and I’m so sad to see it go.”
However, TikTok was not gone for American users for good. Roughly 12 hours after the app shut down in the US, a new pop-up was shown when opening the app. This pop-up thanked users for their patience in the downtime and expressed that TikTok was back by the efforts of President Trump; users were then able to use TikTok as normal. On Monday, January 20th, Trump signed a new executive order to further delay the ban 75 days. “I will issue an executive order on Monday to extend the period of time before the law’s prohibitions take effect, so that we can make a deal to protect our national security,” Trump posted to Truth. Despite having the platform back, some returned and exclaimed their personal feelings on Trump “playing the hero”. These specific users detailed their disappointment in the reinstated president, especially after he originally signed an order to ban TikTok.
Despite temporarily being down and now being temporarily protected with this new order, TikTok’s future in the United States is completely uncertain. What will happen when the 75 days are up? Will the CEO sell TikTok to new management to keep the platform in the US? Only time will tell the fate of the platform so loved from 2018 to now.
