--:-- Steve Inskeep: TikTok's American future is now up to the Supreme Court. The Chinese-owned company wants the high court to stop a ban of the app from taking effect next month.
--:-- Michelle Martin: What does this mean for the tens of millions of TikTok users?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: I'm Steve Inskeep with Michelle Martin, and this is Up First from NPR News.
--:-- Michelle Martin: 7,000 Syrian refugees have been living in a makeshift camp on the Jordanian border for the past nine years. Now, after the fall of the Assad regime, most of them want to go home, but what will wait for them there?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: And Piers Jane Araf is one of the first journalists to have visited the campsite.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Also, judges delivered verdicts in a French rape case that shocked many people around the world. The victim has become a feminist hero, but will the trial make a difference for others?
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Stay with us. We've got the news you need to start your day.
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--:-- Michelle Martin: TikTok and the Department of Justice are heading to the Supreme Court. The court accepted TikTok's request to hear arguments about a law that could ban the viral video app next month.
--:-- Bobby Allen: The court's chosen timing matters here as much as the decision to hear the case. The justices often move deliberately and take many months, but they chose in this case to move quickly, scheduling an argument for TikTok within three weeks on January 10th.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So why is the Supreme Court stepping in?
--:-- Bobby Allen: Well, in short, because TikTok requested an emergency review. And this is TikTok's last legal shot, right? The company has been fighting a law that is set to take effect on January 19th that bans the app nationwide unless it splits off from its Chinese parent company, ByteDance.
--:-- Michelle Martin: It recently lost a lower court appeal. And now the Supreme Court has scheduled expedited oral arguments, and the hearing is happening in three weeks.
--:-- Bobby Allen: What are the main issues the court is being asked to resolve?
--:-- Michelle Martin: Yeah, the case is about the balance between free speech and the possible threat of a foreign adversary.
--:-- Bobby Allen: TikTok has long said that the Chinese government doesn't collect data on Americans and does not use the app to push propaganda. But U.S. officials say the risk of that happening is just too high in that the app has to be put out of business unless it sheds its China-based owner.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Legal scholars say because of the First Amendment, government restrictions on speech are very hard to uphold in court. Usually, the government can only suppress speech if it's really narrowly tailored to deal with a really specific problem.
--:-- Bobby Allen: And a lower court ruled that the Chinese issue is actually enough to justify the ban. But now the Supreme Court is reviewing it, and they could just come down differently.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So it's TikTok's argument that this ban violates Americans' free speech rights.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Yeah, that's right. The 170 million Americans on the app and actually TikTok's own free speech rights, they say, as a corporation, because they have a LA-based company and using the algorithm and pushing content, courts have shown, is another type of free speech.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So there's kind of two free speeches at play here.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Okay, so what could this mean for the tens of millions of Americans who use TikTok? I mean, some people use it every day.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Oh, yeah, yeah. So if the court overturns the law, you know, business as usual for the app. But if it is upheld, it could mean the app is going away very soon.
--:-- Bobby Allen: The law is slated to start, you know, in early January. And at that point, TikTok, you know, will be kicked out of app stores on Apple and Android devices. So you won't be able to download it.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And the app will lose web hosting services. So, you know, all the companies that provide back-end support for TikTok, they'll have to drop the company.
--:-- Bobby Allen: And if this happens, Michelle, it's not like the app's going to disappear from everyone's phone overnight or something. It's just going to get buggy. It's going to get slow. And eventually, it's not going to be able to get software updates. So it'll stop working.
--:-- Michelle Martin: You know, backing up for a moment here, though, you know, never before has the Supreme Court taken on a case over the U.S. government trying to shut down a massive social media platform.
--:-- Bobby Allen: So this is entering some uncharted territory. And, you know, President-elect Donald Trump's administration is watching very closely.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And where does Trump stand on this?
--:-- Bobby Allen: Trump has given mixed signals on TikTok. He said he wanted to save the app and that he credits it with helping young voters turn out for him. But, you know, just this weekend, he said on NBC's Meet the Press, if he will rescue the app. And he gave kind of an unclear, wishy-washy answer.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Remember, Trump tried to ban TikTok during his first term and was not successful.
--:-- Bobby Allen: No matter what, the court decides, though, the Trump administration has a ton of power here. If the Supreme Court upholds this law, his administration will be tasked with interpreting and enforcing it.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So if TikTok loses at the Supreme Court, they're hoping Trump will just step in and rescue the app anyway.
--:-- Bobby Allen: That is NPR's Bobby Allen. Bobby, thank you.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Thanks, Michelle.
--:-- Michelle Martin: There's already a lot changing in Syria now that dictator Bashar al-Assad is gone. For one thing, people can move. Refugees are coming home. Syrians who were stuck on one side or another in the many battle lines can cross them for the first time in years.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: And journalists can get a fuller look at a country in transition. And, I've been traveling the country, and I'm with you on the line now from Damascus.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Good morning, Jane.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: Good morning, Michelle. So, as we said, you've been traveling around Syria this past week. Tell us some of what you found.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Yeah, well, Damascus itself, of course, has changed quite dramatically. I mean, just a couple of minutes ago, there were a bunch of sixth graders who were jumping up and down on a bronze statue of toppled leader Bashar al-Assad's head.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: We wanted to go further afield, though, so we traveled through Syrian southern desert to a place I have been trying to get to for years. It's the Rukban camp, and it's in this remote corner of the desert where people who are fleeing ISIS thought that they could go across to Jordan and then were trapped there.
--:-- Michelle Martin: 7,000 people cut off for nine years.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: There's also a U.S. base there. It's part of the anti-ISIS coalition. They've been partnering with Syrian forces that ended up forcing the retreat of the Syrian regime.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So those refugees, those refugees in their own countries, now have the possibility for the first time to go home. They don't have the money and they don't have a lot of other things, but there is the possibility.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: And up and down that highway we were seeing the same thing. Last night near Hama, one of the key towns that were taken that led to the retreat of the regime there was a truck stop full of families traveling home.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Inside there were Syrians crowding a suite's encounter. I spoke with one young mother who was going home for the first time in 13 years. She was going to introduce her kids to their grandparents.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: There have obviously been a lot of tragedies, a lot of deaths, but for the people who are able to reunite with their families, all of that time makes it somewhat sweeter.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Now, you've also been following what's happening with Syrian Kurdish forces and Syrian Arab forces. The U.S. has been trying to broker a truce there. What did you find out about this?
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: Yesterday at the Euphrates River, about a six-hour drive from Damascus, we were at one of the dividing lines between U.S.-backed Kurdish-led forces and Turkish-backed fighters who played a big role in the retreat of the regime here.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And that road from Damascus to the Euphrates River kind of mirrors the fall of regime forces.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: There were regime tanks on the road being stripped, fuel being siphoned by poor people, defaced posters of the regime, trucks with people heading home.
--:-- Michelle Martin: But then when we got closer to Manbij, where Syrian Arab coalition fighters were recently in control, there was kind of a vacuum there and people were afraid.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: We drove further along to near the actual front line and we spoke to a commander of one of the factions from Luwa al-Shama. He asked us to call him Abu Suleyman. He's the military commander for the operations room.
--:-- Michelle Martin: He told us that the Kurdish-led forces, who he called terrorists, had broken the ceasefire. That's a ceasefire that's been negotiated by the U.S., but it is one of those fault lines and one of the areas of concern for the U.S. and others as to what happens in this new Syria.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: No, conflict's still simmering, it seems like.
--:-- Michelle Martin: That is NPR's Jane Arraf talking with us from Damascus. Jane, thank you.
--:-- Piers Jane Araf: Thank you.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Verdicts this morning have been handed down on a high-profile rape trial in the south of France. 51 men were on trial for raping a woman while she was drugged and unconscious over a period of years.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Her husband was accused of orchestrating this abuse. The trial has shocked France and drawn the world's attention.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And Paris Eleanor Beardsley is at the courthouse now. We're going to go to her in Avignon.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Good morning, Michelle.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Could you just start by reminding us who the accused are and, of course, tell us the verdicts?
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Yeah, well, these are sort of the working-class everyman in France, a baker, a firefighter of all ages and races.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And Giselle Pellicot, she's a victim, her husband was accused. He drugged her and recruited all of these men on an Internet site over a period of 10 years and filmed everything they did.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: He got the maximum sentence 20 years, and all of the other 50 men were found guilty of raping Giselle Pelico.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Even though many of these men claim they did not rape her because her husband said they had permission and that she was in agreement.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: But there are aggravating circumstances to these rapes, and the sentences are all different. So they seem to be tailored to each defendant, and it's still being read out. It's very technical.
--:-- Michelle Martin: So some of the other men are getting lesser sentences than what the prosecution asked for. I'm hearing eight and ten years.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: And a couple of people have just come out of the courtroom shouting and angry. And I'm not sure who that is and what that means, but this could be very conflictual today.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Tell us more. We can hear that there's a hubbub there.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Well, first of all, huge security. There's never been a trial like this in France before. I was out since seven in the morning in front of the courthouse, and there were just hundreds of people from the media all over the world.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And also, you know, supporters of Giselle Pellico, who was the victim, who had banners and placards.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: We watched her family come in. She has three grown children, and they've all testified that this has destroyed their lives. They've all disowned their father.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And also the men who, you know, who have now been convicted because nobody was acquitted. They came in, you know, wearing hoodies and COVID masks and usually accompanied by a family member, a wife, because these guys are inserted into society.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: They have family, some of them. And they were all carrying duffel bags because they are expecting to go straight to prison now from here.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Say more, if you would, about the impact of this trial, which is, as Steve pointed out, it's just, I mean, it's shaken the country to its core.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: And I mean, it's attracted attention all over the world. Absolutely. You know, it has everywhere.
--:-- Michelle Martin: It started a huge conversation about this patriarchal society and the violence against women.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Many people talk about there's a rape culture here, meaning that serious crimes and also street harassment is not taken seriously enough.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And the fact that these men said, well, they didn't rape her, but that's where there was video evidence.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: And so as painful and sordid as this trial was, and to hear it, and they've seen these videos, it's having a positive impact to activists because it's a wake-up moment.
--:-- Michelle Martin: People are taking it seriously.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: There might be more better education now, law enforcement. And French men have been tuned in. Many prominent men have spoken out and said they were ashamed because these guys are not psychotic criminals. They're average men, and they're questioning the macho society.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Before we let you go, tell us a bit more about the victim or the survivor, I think we should say, Giselle Pellicot.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Well, we can call her a hero, too, because she's a petite septuagenarian, and her face is known everywhere in France.
--:-- Michelle Martin: She waived her right to anonymity, insisted this trial be open to the public and the media, and she's changed everything people said.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: She has made shame swap sides from the victims to the rapist. They say she succeeded in doing that.
--:-- Michelle Martin: That is Eleanor Beardsley. NPR's Eleanor Beardsley and Alvinone.
--:-- Eleanor Beardsley: Thank you, Michelle.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And that's Up First for Thursday, December 19th. I'm Michelle Martin. And I'm Steve Inskeep.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: There's an easy way to stay connected to news and podcasts from the NPR network. It is the NPR app.
--:-- Michelle Martin: You hear community coverage from your local station, because this is a network of local stations in communities across this country.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: You also hear stories from around the world and podcast suggestions based on what you like.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Download the NPR app in your app store.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: Today's episode of Up First was edited by Kara Platoni, Arzu Rezvani, Ryland Barton, HJ Mai, and Mohamed ElBardisi.
--:-- Michelle Martin: It was produced by Zia Butch, Nia Dumas, and Katie Klein.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: We get engineering support from Nisha Hines and our technical director is Carly Strange.
--:-- Michelle Martin: We hope you'll join us again tomorrow.
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--:-- Michelle Martin: And some describe Odoo's programs as building blocks for creating a custom software suite.
--:-- Steve Inskeep: But some say Odoo is fertilizer magic beanstalk building blocks for business.
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