Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita’s legal fight against TikTok will remain in state court, a federal judge ruled in an order criticizing the state’s case against the social media app for “irrelevant posturing” and “hyperbolic allegations.”
U.S. District Court Judge Holly A. Brady’s order said the federal court will not take jurisdiction of the state’s civil complaint against TikTok, Inc.
The scope of the allegations — laid out, the judge noted, in a “fifty-one page, two hundred thirty-four paragraph, one hundred forty-one footnote” complaint — prompted TikTok to request the case be moved to federal court. It is one of two lawsuits the state filed Dec. 7 in Allen Superior Court against the popular video-sharing service.
The attorney general’s wide-ranging complaint connects TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance Ltd., to the Chinese Government, alleging personal information from the app can be accessed by China and the Communist Party. It also accused TikTok of violating the state’s Deceptive Consumer Sales Act by misleading Indiana consumers about the access and exploitation of their information.
Brady wrote TikTok’s request for federal jurisdiction was “given credibility by Indiana’s choice to plead matters well-beyond its legal claim,” but she found there are no issues of federal law to be litigated.
The judge’s order said the AG’s one-sentence thesis statement was “stretched into a work longer than Kafka’s The Metamorphosis.” She added “more than 90% of the complaint was devoted to irrelevant posturing,” and said Indiana’s one claim of violation of the Deceptive Consumer Sales Act isn’t made until page 47 of the 51-page filing.
“Only fifteen paragraphs and two pages address Indiana’s actual legal claim,” the judge wrote in the order.
Attorneys for TikTok did not respond to IndyStar request for comment by publication date. Neither did Rokita’s office.
The case is now headed back to the Allen County Superior Court.
Contact Pulliam Fellow Elissa Maudlin at EMaudlin@gannett.com or on Twitter @ejmaudlin.