The U.S. legal fight over TikTok reached a decisive moment in January 2025, when the Supreme Court let stand a law requiring ByteDance to sell TikTok’s U.S. operations or face a nationwide ban. For creators, brands, and agencies, the practical question isn’t abstract constitutional law—it’s contingency planning: audience migration, cross-posting strategies, and how to protect sponsorship pipelines if access is disrupted with little notice. Marketers who rely on TikTok’s discovery engine should be building redundancy on YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels, and emerging conversation platforms while monitoring legal timelines. Even if a sale happens, policy uncertainty tends to depress ad commitments and inflate CPM volatility. If a ban happens, short-form attention will not vanish; it will shift. The winners will be teams that pre-warm communities elsewhere, secure email/SMS touchpoints, and keep creative adaptable to multiple recommendation systems. Outcomes are political, but preparedness is operational.