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OPINION ANALYSIS

Supreme Court upholds TikTok ban

 at 12:45 p.m.

The justices ruled that a law to ban the app is constitutional and does not violate the app or its creators’ First Amendment rights. The bipartisan law, citing national security concerns, will ban the app on Jan. 19 if TikTok’s Chinese parent company ByteDance does not sell its U.S. assets. But President-elect Donald Trump has said he supports TikTok and will find a way to keep the app running.

A statue on the Supreme Court steps.

The court heard the case just last week and issued its opinion extremely quickly, days before the law’s Jan. 19 deadline. (Katie Barlow)

SCOTUS NEWS

Justices take up Maryland parents’ challenge to LGBTQ books in schools

 at 4:25 p.m.

The court agreed to take up five more cases for the current term on Friday, including a dispute brought by a group of Maryland parents who argue that the county requiring their children to participate in instruction on LGBTQ-themed books violates their religious beliefs and thus their First Amendment right to freely exercise their religion. The justices did not act on a number of high-profile cases.

ARGUMENT ANALYSIS

Supreme Court considers Chicago alderman’s “false statement” charges

The court heard arguments on Tuesday in a Chicago politician’s challenge to his conviction for making false statements to bank regulators about loans he failed to pay. After an hour of oral arguments, it wasn’t clear whether the justices would actually decide whether the federal law he was convicted under applies, or whether a majority of the justices believed that a ruling on that question would even help him.

ARGUMENT ANALYSIS

Justices debate right to renew lawsuit after voluntary dismissal

 at 7:57 p.m.

At Tuesday’s argument in Waetzig v. Halliburton Energy Services, a case about the standard for allowing a claimant to reopen a case that he had voluntarily dismissed, the justices seemed to find the dispute uncontentious. Gary Waetzig asked the court to interpret the applicable federal law to allow him to reopen his age discrimination lawsuit against his former employer.

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