--:-- [Up First theme music plays]
--:-- Leila Fadel: The clock is ticking for TikTok users in the United States. And a new court filing shows how the social media company plans to try to block the law that could see it banned in seven months.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Does TikTok make a strong case?
--:-- Leila Fadel: I'm Michelle Martin, that's Leila Fadel, and this is Up First from NPR News.
--:-- [Up First theme music fades out]
--:-- Leila Fadel: Los Angeles, one of the country's largest school districts, voted to ban cell phones in classrooms. They're surreptitiously scrolling in school, in class time, have their head in their hands.
--:-- Michelle Martin: California's Democratic governor is calling for the policy to be implemented statewide.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Why are Democratic and Republican-led states banning cell phones in schools?
--:-- Michelle Martin: And for many people, summer plans means travel. But are the promises companies make of a carbon offset when you book a plane ticket or a car rental false promises?
--:-- Leila Fadel: Stay with us. We'll give you the news you need to start your day.
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--:-- Leila Fadel: TikTok has now offered its first glimpse of how they hope to overturn a law that could have the app banned in the United States in seven months.
--:-- Bobby Allen: The Justice Department says it expects the law to survive the challenge.
--:-- Leila Fadel: It's seen as one of the most important legal battles in the history of the Internet in the United States.
--:-- Leila Fadel: With me now is NPR's tech correspondent, Bobby Allen.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Thanks for being here, Leila.
--:-- Leila Fadel: So let's start with where things currently stand for TikTok.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Yeah, TikTok is in a very precarious situation. In April, President Biden signed a law that bans TikTok nationwide by January 19th, unless it is sold to a non-Chinese buyer.
--:-- Leila Fadel: This is because lawmakers in the White House fear the Chinese government could use TikTok as a spy tool or to spread propaganda to influence elections.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Now, TikTok swiftly went to court to challenge the law, and the future of the app is really riding on the outcome of this case.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And now, as you mentioned, we have TikTok's first major filing in the case, and there's a good amount of new detail in here.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Okay, say more about that. What are TikTok's lawyers arguing to the court?
--:-- Bobby Allen: Yeah, TikTok says the ban would be a First Amendment violation for the app's 170 million users in the U.S.
--:-- Leila Fadel: They argue that, quote, never before has Congress silenced so much speech in a single act.
--:-- Bobby Allen: They've been saying that for a while, but there's also something new.
--:-- Bobby Allen: TikTok's legal team for the first time revealed internal documents spelling out the behind-the-scenes negotiations the company has had with the Biden administration.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And it includes a 100 national security agreement that would have given federal officials oversight of TikTok operations in the U.S.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Including the ability for American officials to effectively hit a kill switch on TikTok nationwide if it was ever considered a threat.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Now, you know, these documents are a big deal because they show that, you know, TikTok was really willing to go the distance to appease Washington's fears, but the Biden administration said no thanks.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Why is that?
--:-- Bobby Allen: Well, the Biden administration wouldn't say exactly why they walked away from the deal, but officials in the administration I've spoken to have said it's because anything short of complete separation of TikTok from its China-based parent company, ByteDance, was seen as a non-starter.
--:-- Leila Fadel: So, let's take a step back here. Why are the stakes in this case larger than TikTok?
--:-- Bobby Allen: Yeah, they really are, Leila. I mean, this case could ultimately be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court, and we haven't ever seen a case that tests the balance between free speech and national security on a massive social media app.
--:-- Leila Fadel: If the ban is upheld, it could further splinter the Internet, right?
--:-- Bobby Allen: There would be one Internet for most of the world that includes TikTok, and then a second Internet in the U.S. that does not include TikTok.
--:-- Leila Fadel: China's Great Firewall blocks many American internet services, but, you know, the U.S. has not done that to a major social media platform before.
--:-- Bobby Allen: So what's next in this legal battle?
--:-- Bobby Allen: Yeah, well, the Justice Department will respond.
--:-- Leila Fadel: In a statement to me, the Justice Department said the law is constitutional, that the department has, quote, consistently warned about the threat of autocratic nations that can weaponize technology.
--:-- Bobby Allen: So that's a preview of what they're likely to argue.
--:-- Leila Fadel: But experts say the focus will really be on what kind of hard evidence the Justice Department can muster because so far the case against TikTok has been hypothetical.
--:-- Bobby Allen: And the appeals court that is hearing the case will likely be interested in what kind of proof the government has that TikTok is currently a danger to Americans.
--:-- Leila Fadel: That's NPR's Bobby Allen. Thanks, Bobby.
--:-- Bobby Allen: Thanks, Leila.
--:-- Leila Fadel: The Los Angeles School Board has voted to ban the use of cell phones in the country's second largest school district.
--:-- Leila Fadel: L.A. School Board member Nick Melvoin pointed to studies highlighting the harmful effects of cell phones in the classroom.
--:-- Nick Melvoin: They're surreptitiously scrolling in school, in class time, have their head in their hands walking down the hallways.
--:-- Leila Fadel: California's Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom is pushing to implement a statewide ban, and that's after Republican-led states such as Indiana and Florida have already put their own bans in place.
--:-- Leila Fadel: With me now is Alison Klein. She's a reporter for Education Week.
--:-- Alison Klein: Good morning, Alison.
--:-- Leila Fadel: So banning smartphones in schools is one of those rare policies that Republicans and Democrats seem to agree on, but it hasn't always been a popular idea.
--:-- Alison Klein: So I think during the pandemic, kids just had access to their tech 24-7.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And many say that they're addicted to them, right?
--:-- Alison Klein: Kids get hundreds of notifications a day, a study by Common Sense Media found.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And that can make it hard to focus all those dings in class, right?
--:-- Alison Klein: All that buzzing.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And the same study by Common Sense found that nearly all students use their phone at some point during the day for about 43 minutes, which is about the same time as a class period.
--:-- Alison Klein: So they're spending about as much time gaming or watching YouTube or on TikTok as they are in chemistry class.
--:-- Leila Fadel: So earlier this week, the US Surgeon General called for a warning label on social media saying it's harmful to kids' mental health.
--:-- Alison Klein: Is that part of why more schools want to ban cell phones, or is it mostly about kids paying attention in class?
--:-- Alison Klein: So I think it's a mix of both.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Yes, kids are obviously distracted in class, although there are some teachers who really don't want to see cell phones banned because they're using them as a teaching tool.
--:-- Alison Klein: Phones though are also changing how kids socialize with each other.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And you heard the L.A. school board member reference this.
--:-- Alison Klein: I had one principal tell me that there are days when his lunchroom is basically quiet and kids are texting the kid across the table from them instead of actually talking to each other.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Okay, another form of communication.
--:-- Alison Klein: Has anyone figured out a good way to implement and enforce these restrictions?
--:-- Alison Klein: So it's often up to teachers to enforce these bans, which really puts them in a tough spot with their students.
--:-- Leila Fadel: It's kind of like playing whack-a-mole, right?
--:-- Alison Klein: They're just taking a phone away every minute.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And back in 2015, New York City reversed its ban on cell phones because they found there were some really big equity issues.
--:-- Alison Klein: Essentially, the ban was being really strictly enforced at schools serving mostly low-income kids and not so strictly enforced at some of the wealthier schools.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And there were even some local stores that were charging kids money to hold their cell phones all day so they could get it right after school.
--:-- Alison Klein: It really just got to be too much, so it'll be interesting to see whether L.A. has those same problems.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And how are students and their parents reacting to these recent bans?
--:-- Alison Klein: So a lot of parents want their kids to have their phone in school basically so they can reach them in case of an emergency.
--:-- Leila Fadel: I talked to a superintendent one time who said a parent told her that she could take away her kid's phone once she started paying the family's cell phone bill.
--:-- Alison Klein: But in other cases, parents understand that this is about focusing in class.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And it's important to say that these bans don't necessarily say you can't have your phone in school at all.
--:-- Alison Klein: Some schools require kids to keep their phone in their locker, for instance.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Alison Klein, reporter for Education Week. Thanks, Alison.
--:-- Alison Klein: Thank you.
--:-- Leila Fadel: It's summer and if you're lucky you may be booking a plane ticket or a car rental for vacation and when you click buy sometimes an offer pops up for something called a carbon offset to reduce climate pollution.
--:-- Leila Fadel: But how can you know that offset is doing what it claims?
--:-- Leila Fadel: Joining us now to talk about this is NPR's Julia Simon.
--:-- Julia Simon: Good morning.
--:-- Leila Fadel: So first off, what really is a carbon offset?
--:-- Julia Simon: I spoke to Danny Cullenward at UPenn about this. He says an offset is basically a promise.
--:-- Leila Fadel: It's a promise that somebody else did something good somewhere else that resulted in a climate benefit.
--:-- Julia Simon: It could be a promise that someone protected a forest that would have been cut down or a promise that someone made a wind farm and switched from fossil fuels.
--:-- Leila Fadel: The key promise being your money is actually reducing or removing planet heating pollution, like that carbon dioxide pollution from your flight or your car rental.
--:-- Julia Simon: But Barbara Haya at UC Berkeley says there's a problem.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Most offsets don't represent what they claim.
--:-- Julia Simon: There are two big ways many offsets can be false promises.
--:-- Leila Fadel: First, many offset projects overestimate their impact.
--:-- Julia Simon: For example, many offset projects that claim they're saving forests from deforestation, research finds many are getting money for forests that don't actually need protection.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Okay, well, that feels like a big problem.
--:-- Julia Simon: If your money isn't actually reducing as much climate pollution as the offset claims, what's the other issue?
--:-- Julia Simon: Something called permanence.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Offsets are supposed to reduce or remove carbon dioxide pollution, right?
--:-- Julia Simon: The carbon dioxide, some carbon dioxide stays in the atmosphere hundreds of years.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Some CO2 sticks around even longer, thousands of years.
--:-- Julia Simon: Here's the thing.
--:-- Leila Fadel: The vast majority of carbon offsets only promise to remove or store CO2 emissions for 40 years or less.
--:-- Julia Simon: Colin Ward says a 40 promise of reducing emissions does not compare to a 300 or several thousand impact of carbon dioxide.
--:-- Leila Fadel: So if a lot of these are false promises is the government doing anything to address these issues with offsets consumers and companies are buying?
--:-- Julia Simon: Late last month, the Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen announced new principles for high-quality carbon offsets.
--:-- Leila Fadel: High quality, that is, offsets that actually reduce or remove climate pollution.
--:-- Julia Simon: But researchers say even these new principles have gaps.
--:-- Leila Fadel: For example, the principles do not identify how long offsets have to keep carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere.
--:-- Julia Simon: No number.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Also, these are just principles.
--:-- Julia Simon: Researchers worry without enforcement, these voluntary principles might or might not be followed.
--:-- Leila Fadel: A Treasury spokesperson said, though the principles released last month are voluntary, we believe they can help guide efforts to address the challenges.
--:-- Julia Simon: So then is there any actual accountability if a carbon offset company makes a climate claim that's false?
--:-- Leila Fadel: Is there a way for consumers to take action or is there enforcement here?
--:-- Julia Simon: In California, there is a bill in the state assembly right now.
--:-- Leila Fadel: All those promises of climate benefits that carbon offset companies make, this bill would make those claims legally enforceable.
--:-- Julia Simon: So if that company knows that I'm not getting what I paid for and you paid for it, you can take them to court.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Okay, we'll see if that carbon offset bill becomes a law.
--:-- Julia Simon: That's NPR's Julia Simon. Thank you, Julia.
--:-- Julia Simon: Thank you, Leila.
--:-- Leila Fadel: And that's Up First for Friday, June 21st.
--:-- Leila Fadel: I'm Leila Fadel. And I'm Michelle Martin.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Thanks for listening to Up First.
--:-- Leila Fadel: You can find more in-depth coverage of the stories we talked about today and more on NPR's Morning Edition.
--:-- Michelle Martin: That's the radio show that Leila Fadel, Steve Inskeep, A. Martinez, and I host.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Find Morning Edition on your local NPR station at stations.npr.org.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And don't forget, Up First airs on the weekend, too.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Ayesha Rascoe and Scott Simon have the news.
--:-- Michelle Martin: It'll be here in this feed or wherever you get your podcasts.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Today's episode of Up First was edited by Gabrielle Spitzer, Ali Schweitzer, Neela Banerjee, Mohamed El-Bardisi, and Lisa Thompson.
--:-- Michelle Martin: It was produced by Ziad Butch, Christopher Thomas, and Taylor Haney.
--:-- Leila Fadel: We get engineering support from Carly Strange, and our technical director is Zach Coleman.
--:-- Michelle Martin: Our executive producer is Erica Aguilar.
--:-- Leila Fadel: Join us again on Monday.
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--:-- Announcer: And each mattress is designed with specific sleep positions and feel preferences in mind.
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--:-- Leila Fadel: Thanks for listening to Up First.
--:-- Michelle Martin: And we'll see you again soon.
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