Five TikTok users in Montana have filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn the ban on the short-form video platform, claiming the law violates their First Amendment rights.
The lawsuit was filed Wednesday, May 17, shortly after Montana Governor Greg Gianforte signed a bill restricting app downloads into law.
The five plaintiffs — Samantha Alario, Heather Dirocco, Carly Ann Goddard, Alice Held and Dale Stout — are Montana residents who describe themselves as “content creators and viewers on TikTok.”
“Montana has no power to enact laws that advance what it believes should be United States foreign policy or national security interests, nor can Montana shut down an entire forum for communications based on his perceptions that certain speech shared via this forum, while protected by the First Amendment, is dangerous,” they said in the lawsuit.
They argued that the government’s claimed interests in Senate Bill 419 (SB 419) “are not legitimate and do not support a blanket ban on TikTok.”
“Even if Montana could regulate any of the speech users share via TikTok, SB 419 wields a hammer when the First Amendment requires a scalpel.”
The lead attorney in the trial, filed by Davis Wright Termaineis Ambika Kumar, who represented other creators in seeking an injunction from former President Donald Trump’s 2020 TikTok ban.
“Even if Montana could regulate any of the speech users share via TikTok, SB 419 wields a hammer when the First Amendment requires a scalpel.”
TikTok creators
The TikTok creators’ legal team also claimed that SB 419 is unconstitutional and preempted by federal law because it violates several constitutional provisions.
They argued that the law not only violates individual rights, but also ignores the preemption of federal law over matters involving national security and foreign economic actors.
The plaintiffs claim that SB 419 is preempted by the emergency international economic powers of the United States Defense Production Act, which authorizes the President and the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), not individual statesto investigate and address national security risks associated with foreign economic actors.
Montana is the first state in the United States to enact an outright ban on TikTok.
By banning the app, Montana emphasized that the measure was taken to protect users’ private data and sensitive personal information from harvesting by the Chinese Communist Party.
“The Chinese Communist Party using TikTok to spy on Americans, violate their privacy and harvest their personal, private and sensitive information is well documented,” Gianforte said after signing the bill.
The ban also imposes a fine of $10,000 a day on app stores whenever someone “is offered the opportunity” to download the app.
The TikTok creators who filed the case are seeking to preserve their rights to post, view and share content through TikTok after amassing a significant following, according to the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Montana.
The lawsuit was filed against the office of Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen.
In response, Knudsen spokesperson Emily Flower reportedly said Reuters“We expected a legal challenge and are fully prepared to defend the law.”
TikTok, which has already spent millions of dollars lobbying the US government to keep the ban in place in the country, has previously denounced the ban as “illegal”.
“We want to reassure Montanans that they can continue to use TikTok to express themselves, earn a living and find community as we continue to work to defend the rights of our users inside and outside. outside of Montana,” TikTok spokeswoman Brooke Oberwetter said. said.
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