Texas TikTok Ban Challenged for Threatening ‘Academic Freedom’

A ban of TikTok on state devices and networks in Texas was challenged by First Amendment lawyers on Thursday, who said the law violated the Constitution by limiting research and teaching at public universities.

The Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University filed the lawsuit on behalf of the Coalition for Independent Technology Research, whose members include Texas college professors who say their work was compromised after they lost access to TikTok on campus Wi-Fi and university-issued computers.

The suit offers a glimpse into the real-world effect of bans targeting TikTok and the mounting legal pushback accompanying the efforts. Universities in more than 20 states have banned TikTok in some fashion, according to the institute, based on new rules from lawmakers who say TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, poses a national security threat.

The Knight First Amendment Institute, which works on free speech cases pro bono, wants Texas and other states to exempt university faculty from the bans.

“The Supreme Court has characterized academic freedom as a special concern of the First Amendment,” said Ramya Krishnan, a lawyer at the Knight First Amendment Institute. “With so many Americans on TikTok, it’s important that researchers are able to study the impact that this platform is having on public discourse and society more generally.”

Representatives for Gov. Greg Abbott, who announced the Texas ban in December, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.