Supreme Court considers upholding law that could force TikTok to shut down in US

The TikTok Inc building in Culver City, California (Damian Dovarganes/AP)

The US Supreme Court on Friday seemed likely to uphold a law that would ban TikTok in the United States beginning on January 19 unless the popular social media platform is sold by its China-based parent company.

Hearing arguments 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 US.