Trump delaying the TikTok ban is the most lawless thing he's done yet

USA Today

4 hours ago

The president does not have discretion over which laws he would like to enforce and which he would like to ignore. Trump's decision to arbitrarily extend TikTok's lifespan does exactly that.
The first several months of Donald Trump's second presidential term have been marked by controversy and charges that he's a lawless president.
However, the most brazen example of Trump's lawlessness is his refusal to enforce the TikTok ban, which has been passed by Congress and upheld by the Supreme Court. On June 19, Trump extended the deadline for TikTok to shut down by another 90 days, marking the third time he has done so.
The TikTok ban is the law of the land, and Trump's refusal to enforce it is a dereliction of his duties as president. Those who are silent on it should put aside their own personal motives and bring more attention to this fact.
TikTok ban is the law of the land
Many forget that a TikTok ban was originally Trump's idea, and that many Democrats wrote the idea off as just another piece of his anti-China agenda. However, things have changed. Trump seemingly developed a soft spot for TikTok because he believes it helped him win reelection.
Still, in the time between Trump's original stance and his change of heart on the issue, a law banning TikTok passed the House and Senate and was signed in 2024 by then-President Joe Biden.
The Supreme Court even upheld the ban, against the arguments of TikTok's lawyers.
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The law banning TikTok does have a provision that allows for the president to delay the deadline for TikTok to cease operations or agree to a sale. Still, the criteria allowing for such an extension are nowhere close to being fulfilled.
The text of the ban allows for the president to extend the deadline a single time for 90 days, so long as TikTok is close to reaching a deal with an American company to sell. There is no indication that's the case, and Trump's arbitrary executive orders are flagrantly illegal.
Even Trump's guise in refusing to enforce the law – the idea that he is attempting to give TikTok time to broker a deal − doesn't make sense. Nothing would be more compelling for TikTok to sell the app to an American company than the ban going into effect. An app that cannot run is useless to its owners, and their best course of action would be to sell.
Trump has no authority to refuse to enforce the law
The president does not have discretion over which laws he would like to enforce and which he would like to ignore. Trump's decision to arbitrarily extend TikTok's lifespan does exactly that.
The president, along with the rest of the executive branch, has an obligation to enforce the laws of the nation that have been passed by Congress and signed into law. A president's job is to enforce the law, whereas Congress' job is to decide what the law is. When a president can choose which laws he is to enforce, he is deciding what the law is, in a sense.
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That's why Trump's refusal to enforce the ban is his most lawless action as president. Sure, there's the constitutionality of his deportation schemes and his reinterpretation of birthright citizenship, but those instances had judicial checks. In no other area is Trump as actively derelict in his duties as president without repercussions as he is in relation to the TikTok ban.
For all the talk about Trump being a lawless president, Democrats and Republicans have both been relatively quiet about this single worst example of Trump acting as such.
Republicans should be wary about the next administration of Democrats that comes along refusing to enforce a certain law because they disagree with it, or they simply don't feel like it. If Democrats were the ones refusing to enforce the ban on TikTok, it would be the only thing Republicans talked about.
I'm sure that the outrage would be far louder if Trump were refusing to enforce other statutes, such as parts of the National Firearms Act, the tax code, or any other number of statutes that Democrats are sympathetic to. However, because it concerns a popular social media platform remaining in service, the complaints are rather quiet.
Refusal to enforce laws is not a path Americans want our presidents to travel. That slippery slope can take us to some very dangerous places.
Dace Potas is an opinion columnist for USA TODAY and a graduate of DePaul University with a degree in political science.