what is the first paragraph of an argumentative essay called

Argumentative Essay – Outline, Form, and Examples

What is an argumentative essay?

An argumentative essay requires the writer to investigate a specific topic by collecting and evaluating evidence to establish a position on the subject matter.

When preparing to compose a good argumentative essay, utilize the following steps:

Step 1: Select a topic.

Step 2: Identify a position.

Step 3: Locate appropriate resources.

Step 4: Identify evidence supporting the position. ( NOTE: If there is little evidence in support of the claim, consider re-examining the main argument.)

When gathering evidence, use credible sources . To determine the credibility of the source, consider authority, currency, accuracy, and objectivity:

Who is the author ? Are they an expert in the field? Has a reputable publisher published the work?

How current is the information in the source? Does the currency of the source matter? Does the age of the source impact the content? Is there newer information that disproves the source’s information?

Can other sources verify the accuracy of the information? Does the information contradict that found in other commonly accepted sources?

Is there any evidence of bias, or is the source objective ? Is the research sponsored by an organization that may skew the information?

The following are typically recognized as providing appropriate, credible research material:

Peer-reviewed journals/research papers

Government agencies

Professional organizations

Library databases

Reference books

Writers should avoid using the following sources:

Social media posts

Out-of-date materials

Step 5: Utilize the research to determine a thesis statement that identifies the topic, position, and support(s).

Step 6: Use the evidence to construct an outline, detailing the main supports and relevant evidence.

Argumentative essay outline

After gathering all of the necessary research, the next step in composing an argumentative essay focuses on organizing the information through the use of an outline:

Introduction

Attention Grabber/Hook

Background Information: Include any background information pertinent to the topic that the reader needs to know to understand the argument.

Thesis: State the position in connection to the main topic and identify the supports that will help prove the argument.

Topic sentence

Identify evidence in support of the claim in the topic sentence

Explain how the evidence supports the argument

Evidence 3 (Continue as needed)

Support 2 (Continue as needed)

Restate thesis

Review main supports

Concluding statement

Invite the audience to take a specific action.

Identify the overall importance of the topic and position.

How to write an argumentative essay

Regardless of the writer’s topic or point of view, an argumentative essay should include an introductory paragraph, body paragraphs, a conclusion, and works cited.

Background information

Body Paragraphs

Analysis of evidence

Rephrased thesis

Review of main ideas

Call to action

Works Cited

Argumentative essay introduction

The introduction sets the tone for the entire paper and introduces the argument. In general, the first paragraph(s) should attract the reader’s attention, provide relevant context, and conclude with a thesis statement.

To attract the reader's attention , start with an introductory device. There are several attention-grabbing techniques, the most common of which consist of the following:

The writer can emphasize the topic’s importance by explaining the current interest in the topic or indicating that the subject is influential.

Pertinent statistics give the paper an air of authority.

There are many reasons for a stimulating statement to surprise a reader. Sometimes it is joyful; sometimes it is shocking; sometimes it is surprising because of who said it.

An interesting incident or anecdote can act as a teaser to lure the reader into the remainder of the essay. Be sure that the device is appropriate for the subject and focus of what follows.

Provide the reader with relevant context and background information necessary to understand the topic.

Conclude with a thesis statement that identifies the overall purpose of the essay (topic and position). Writers can also include their support directly in the thesis, which outlines the structure of the essay for the reader.

Avoid the following when writing the introduction to argumentative writing:

Starting with dictionary definitions is too overdone and unappealing.

Do not make an announcement of the topic like “In this paper I will…” or “The purpose of this essay is to….”

Evidence supporting or developing the thesis should be in the body paragraphs, not the introduction.

Beginning the essay with general or absolute statements such as “throughout history...” or “as human beings we always...” or similar statements suggest the writer knows all of history or that all people behave or think in the same way.

Argumentative essay thesis

The thesis statement is the single, specific claim the writer sets out to prove and is typically positioned as the last sentence of the introduction . It is the controlling idea of the entire argument that identifies the topic, position, and reasoning.

When constructing a thesis for an argumentative paper, make sure it contains a side of the argument, not simply a topic. An argumentative thesis identifies the writer’s position on a given topic. If a position cannot be taken, then it is not argumentative thesis:

Topic: Capital punishment is practiced in many states.

Thesis: Capital punishment should be illegal.

While not always required, the thesis statement can include the supports the writer will use to prove the main claim. Therefore, a thesis statement can be structured as follows:

TOPIC + POSITION (+ SUPPORTS)

No Supports: College athletes (TOPIC) should be financially compensated (POSITION).

Supports: College athletes (TOPIC) should be financially compensated (POSITION) because they sacrifice their minds and bodies (SUPPORT 1), cannot hold

Argumentative essay body paragraphs

Body paragraphs can be of varying lengths, but they must present a coherent argument unified under a single topic. They are rarely ever longer than one page, double-spaced; usually they are much shorter.

Lengthy paragraphs indicate a lack of structure. Identify the main ideas of a lengthy paragraph to determine if they make more sense as separate topics in separate paragraphs.

Shorter paragraphs usually indicate a lack of substance; there is not enough evidence or analysis to prove the argument. Develop the ideas more or integrate the information into another paragraph.

The structure of an argumentative paragraph should include a topic sentence, evidence, and a transition.

The topic sentence is the thesis of the paragraph that identifies the arguable point in support of the main argument. The reader should know exactly what the writer is trying to prove within the paragraph by reading the first sentence.

The supporting evidence and analysis provide information to support the claim. There should be a balance between the evidence (facts, quotations, summary of events/plot, etc.) and analysis (interpretation of evidence). If the paragraph is evidence-heavy, there is not much of an argument; if it is analysis-heavy, there is not enough evidence in support of the claim.

The transition can be at the beginning or the end of a paragraph. However, it is much easier to combine the transition with the concluding observation to help the paragraphs flow into one another. Transitions in academic writing should tell the reader where you were, where you are going, and relate to the thesis.

Some essays may benefit from the inclusion of rebuttals to potential counterarguments of the writer’s position.

Argumentative essay conclusion

The conclusion should make readers glad they read the paper. It can suggest broader implications that will not only interest readers but also enrich their understanding in some way. There are three aspects to follow when constructing the conclusion: rephrase the thesis, synthesize information, and call the reader to action.

Rephrased the thesis in the first sentence of the conclusion. It must be in different words; do not simply write it verbatim.

Synthesize the argument by showing how the paper's main points support the argument.

Propose a course of action or a solution to an issue. This can redirect the reader's thought process to apply the ideas to their life or to see the broader implications of the topic.

Avoid the following when constructing the conclusion:

Beginning with an unnecessary, overused phrase such as "in conclusion," "in summary," or "in closing;" although these phrases can work in speeches, they come across as trite in writing

Introducing a new idea or subtopic in the conclusion

Making sentimental, emotional appeals that are out of character with the rest of the paper

Including evidence (quotations, statistics, etc.) that should be in the body of the paper

Argumentative essay examples

Examples of argumentative essays vary depending upon the type:

Academic essays differ based upon the topic and position. These essays follow a more traditional structure and are typically assigned in high school or college. Examples of academic argumentative essay topics include the following:

Advantages or disadvantages of social media

Animal testing

Art education

Benefit or detriment of homework

Capital punishment

Class warfare

Immigration

School uniforms

Universal healthcare

Violence in video games

Argumentative literary essays are typically more informal and do not follow the same structure as an academic essay. The following are popular examples of argumentative literary essays:

“Letter from Birmingham Jail” by Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Death of the Moth” by Virginia Woolf

“Shooting an Elephant” by George Orwell

“Thoughts for the Times on War and Death” by Sigmund Freud

“Does the Truth Matter? Science, Pseudoscience, and Civilization” by Carl Sagan

“Self-Reliance” by Ralph Waldo Emerson

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• Writing Tips

How to Write an Argumentative Essay

4-minute read

• 30th April 2022

An argumentative essay is a structured, compelling piece of writing where an author clearly defines their stance on a specific topic. This is a very popular style of writing assigned to students at schools, colleges, and universities. Learn the steps to researching, structuring, and writing an effective argumentative essay below.

Requirements of an Argumentative Essay

To effectively achieve its purpose, an argumentative essay must contain:

●  A concise thesis statement that introduces readers to the central argument of the essay

●  A clear, logical, argument that engages readers

●  Ample research and evidence that supports your argument

Approaches to Use in Your Argumentative Essay

1.   classical.

●  Clearly present the central argument.

●  Outline your opinion.

●  Provide enough evidence to support your theory.

2.   Toulmin

●  State your claim.

●  Supply the evidence for your stance.

●  Explain how these findings support the argument.

●  Include and discuss any limitations of your belief.

3.   Rogerian

●  Explain the opposing stance of your argument.

●  Discuss the problems with adopting this viewpoint.

●  Offer your position on the matter.

●  Provide reasons for why yours is the more beneficial stance.

●  Include a potential compromise for the topic at hand.

Tips for Writing a Well-Written Argumentative Essay

●  Introduce your topic in a bold, direct, and engaging manner to captivate your readers and encourage them to keep reading.

●  Provide sufficient evidence to justify your argument and convince readers to adopt this point of view.

●  Consider, include, and fairly present all sides of the topic.

●  Structure your argument in a clear, logical manner that helps your readers to understand your thought process.

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●  Discuss any counterarguments that might be posed.

●  Use persuasive writing that’s appropriate for your target audience and motivates them to agree with you.

Steps to Write an Argumentative Essay

Follow these basic steps to write a powerful and meaningful argumentative essay :

Step 1: Choose a topic that you’re passionate about

If you’ve already been given a topic to write about, pick a stance that resonates deeply with you. This will shine through in your writing, make the research process easier, and positively influence the outcome of your argument.

Step 2: Conduct ample research to prove the validity of your argument

To write an emotive argumentative essay , finding enough research to support your theory is a must. You’ll need solid evidence to convince readers to agree with your take on the matter. You’ll also need to logically organize the research so that it naturally convinces readers of your viewpoint and leaves no room for questioning.

Step 3: Follow a simple, easy-to-follow structure and compile your essay

A good structure to ensure a well-written and effective argumentative essay includes:

Introduction

●  Introduce your topic.

●  Offer background information on the claim.

●  Discuss the evidence you’ll present to support your argument.

●  State your thesis statement, a one-to-two sentence summary of your claim.

●  This is the section where you’ll develop and expand on your argument.

●  It should be split into three or four coherent paragraphs, with each one presenting its own idea.

●  Start each paragraph with a topic sentence that indicates why readers should adopt your belief or stance.

●  Include your research, statistics, citations, and other supporting evidence.

●  Discuss opposing viewpoints and why they’re invalid.

●  This part typically consists of one paragraph.

●  Summarize your research and the findings that were presented.

●  Emphasize your initial thesis statement.

●  Persuade readers to agree with your stance.

We certainly hope that you feel inspired to use these tips when writing your next argumentative essay . And, if you’re currently elbow-deep in writing one, consider submitting a free sample to us once it’s completed. Our expert team of editors can help ensure that it’s concise, error-free, and effective!

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Sat / act prep online guides and tips, 3 key tips for how to write an argumentative essay.

General Education

If there’s one writing skill you need to have in your toolkit for standardized tests, AP exams, and college-level writing, it’s the ability to make a persuasive argument. Effectively arguing for a position on a topic or issue isn’t just for the debate team— it’s for anyone who wants to ace the essay portion of an exam or make As in college courses.

To give you everything you need to know about how to write an argumentative essay , we’re going to answer the following questions for you:

• What is an argumentative essay?
• How should an argumentative essay be structured?
• How do I write a strong argument?
• What’s an example of a strong argumentative essay?
• What are the top takeaways for writing argumentative papers?

By the end of this article, you’ll be prepped and ready to write a great argumentative essay yourself!

Now, let’s break this down.

What Is an Argumentative Essay?

An argumentative essay is a type of writing that presents the writer’s position or stance on a specific topic and uses evidence to support that position. The goal of an argumentative essay is to convince your reader that your position is logical, ethical, and, ultimately, right . In argumentative essays, writers accomplish this by writing:

• A clear, persuasive thesis statement in the introduction paragraph
• Body paragraphs that use evidence and explanations to support the thesis statement
• A paragraph addressing opposing positions on the topic—when appropriate
• A conclusion that gives the audience something meaningful to think about.

Introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion: these are the main sections of an argumentative essay. Those probably sound familiar. Where does arguing come into all of this, though? It’s not like you’re having a shouting match with your little brother across the dinner table. You’re just writing words down on a page!

...or are you? Even though writing papers can feel like a lonely process, one of the most important things you can do to be successful in argumentative writing is to think about your argument as participating in a larger conversation . For one thing, you’re going to be responding to the ideas of others as you write your argument. And when you’re done writing, someone—a teacher, a professor, or exam scorer—is going to be reading and evaluating your argument.

If you want to make a strong argument on any topic, you have to get informed about what’s already been said on that topic . That includes researching the different views and positions, figuring out what evidence has been produced, and learning the history of the topic. That means—you guessed it!—argumentative essays almost always require you to incorporate outside sources into your writing.  

What Makes Argumentative Essays Unique?

Argumentative essays are different from other types of essays for one main reason: in an argumentative essay, you decide what the argument will be . Some types of essays, like summaries or syntheses, don’t want you to show your stance on the topic—they want you to remain unbiased and neutral.

In argumentative essays, you’re presenting your point of view as the writer and, sometimes, choosing the topic you’ll be arguing about. You just want to make sure that that point of view comes across as informed, well-reasoned, and persuasive.

Another thing about argumentative essays: they’re often longer than other types of essays. Why, you ask? Because it takes time to develop an effective argument. If your argument is going to be persuasive to readers, you have to address multiple points that support your argument, acknowledge counterpoints, and provide enough evidence and explanations to convince your reader that your points are valid.

Our 3 Best Tips for Picking a Great Argumentative Topic

The first step to writing an argumentative essay deciding what to write about! Choosing a topic for your argumentative essay might seem daunting, though. It can feel like you could make an argument about anything under the sun. For example, you could write an argumentative essay about how cats are way cooler than dogs, right?

It’s not quite that simple . Here are some strategies for choosing a topic that serves as a solid foundation for a strong argument.

Choose a Topic That Can Be Supported With Evidence

First, you want to make sure the topic you choose allows you to make a claim that can be supported by evidence that’s considered credible and appropriate for the subject matter ...and, unfortunately, your personal opinions or that Buzzfeed quiz you took last week don’t quite make the cut.

Some topics—like whether cats or dogs are cooler—can generate heated arguments, but at the end of the day, any argument you make on that topic is just going to be a matter of opinion. You have to pick a topic that allows you to take a position that can be supported by actual, researched evidence.

(Quick note: you could write an argumentative paper over the general idea that dogs are better than cats—or visa versa!—if you’re a) more specific and b) choose an idea that has some scientific research behind it. For example, a strong argumentative topic could be proving that dogs make better assistance animals than cats do.)

You also don’t want to make an argument about a topic that’s already a proven fact, like that drinking water is good for you. While some people might dislike the taste of water, there is an overwhelming body of evidence that proves—beyond the shadow of a doubt—that drinking water is a key part of good health.  

To avoid choosing a topic that’s either unprovable or already proven, try brainstorming some issues that have recently been discussed in the news, that you’ve seen people debating on social media, or that affect your local community. If you explore those outlets for potential topics, you’ll likely stumble upon something that piques your audience’s interest as well.  

Choose a Topic That You Find Interesting

Topics that have local, national, or global relevance often also resonate with us on a personal level. Consider choosing a topic that holds a connection between something you know or care about and something that is relevant to the rest of society. These don’t have to be super serious issues, but they should be topics that are timely and significant.

For example, if you are a huge football fan, a great argumentative topic for you might be arguing whether football leagues need to do more to prevent concussions . Is this as “important” an issue as climate change? No, but it’s still a timely topic that affects many people. And not only is this a great argumentative topic: you also get to write about one of your passions! Ultimately, if you’re working with a topic you enjoy, you’ll have more to say—and probably write a better essay .

Choose a Topic That Doesn’t Get You Too Heated

Another word of caution on choosing a topic for an argumentative paper: while it can be effective to choose a topic that matters to you personally, you also want to make sure you’re choosing a topic that you can keep your cool over. You’ve got to be able to stay unemotional, interpret the evidence persuasively, and, when appropriate, discuss opposing points of view without getting too salty.

In some situations, choosing a topic for your argumentative paper won’t be an issue at all: the test or exam will choose it for you . In that case, you’ve got to do the best you can with what you’re given.

In the next sections, we’re going to break down how to write any argumentative essay —regardless of whether you get to choose your own topic or have one assigned to you! Our expert tips and tricks will make sure that you’re knocking your paper out of the park.

The Thesis: The Argumentative Essay’s Backbone

You’ve chosen a topic or, more likely, read the exam question telling you to defend, challenge, or qualify a claim on an assigned topic. What do you do now?

You establish your position on the topic by writing a killer thesis statement ! The thesis statement, sometimes just called “the thesis,” is the backbone of your argument, the north star that keeps you oriented as you develop your main points, the—well, you get the idea.

In more concrete terms, a thesis statement conveys your point of view on your topic, usually in one sentence toward the end of your introduction paragraph . It’s very important that you state your point of view in your thesis statement in an argumentative way—in other words, it should state a point of view that is debatable.

And since your thesis statement is going to present your argument on the topic, it’s the thing that you’ll spend the rest of your argumentative paper defending. That’s where persuasion comes in. Your thesis statement tells your reader what your argument is, then the rest of your essay shows and explains why your argument is logical.

Why does an argumentative essay need a thesis, though? Well, the thesis statement—the sentence with your main claim—is actually the entire point of an argumentative essay. If you don’t clearly state an arguable claim at the beginning of your paper, then it’s not an argumentative essay. No thesis statement = no argumentative essay. Got it?

Other types of essays that you’re familiar with might simply use a thesis statement to forecast what the rest of the essay is going to discuss or to communicate what the topic is. That’s not the case here. If your thesis statement doesn’t make a claim or establish your position, you’ll need to go back to the drawing board.

Example Thesis Statements

Here are a couple of examples of thesis statements that aren’t argumentative and thesis statements that are argumentative

The sky is blue.

The thesis statement above conveys a fact, not a claim, so it’s not argumentative.

To keep the sky blue, governments must pass clean air legislation and regulate emissions.

The second example states a position on a topic. What’s the topic in that second sentence? The best way to keep the sky blue. And what position is being conveyed? That the best way to keep the sky blue is by passing clean air legislation and regulating emissions.

Some people would probably respond to that thesis statement with gusto: “No! Governments should not pass clean air legislation and regulate emissions! That infringes on my right to pollute the earth!” And there you have it: a thesis statement that presents a clear, debatable position on a topic.

Here’s one more set of thesis statement examples, just to throw in a little variety:

Spirituality and otherworldliness characterize A$AP Rocky’s portrayals of urban life and the American Dream in his rap songs and music videos.

The statement above is another example that isn’t argumentative, but you could write a really interesting analytical essay with that thesis statement. Long live A$AP! Now here’s another one that is argumentative:

To give students an understanding of the role of the American Dream in contemporary life, teachers should incorporate pop culture, like the music of A$AP Rocky, into their lessons and curriculum.

The argument in this one? Teachers should incorporate more relevant pop culture texts into their curriculum.

This thesis statement also gives a specific reason for making the argument above: To give students an understanding of the role of the American Dream in contemporary life. If you can let your reader know why you’re making your argument in your thesis statement, it will help them understand your argument better.

An actual image of you killing your argumentative essay prompts after reading this article! 

Breaking Down the Sections of An Argumentative Essay

Now that you know how to pick a topic for an argumentative essay and how to make a strong claim on your topic in a thesis statement, you’re ready to think about writing the other sections of an argumentative essay. These are the parts that will flesh out your argument and support the claim you made in your thesis statement.  

Like other types of essays, argumentative essays typically have three main sections: the introduction, the body, and the conclusion. Within those sections, there are some key elements that a reader—and especially an exam scorer or professor—is always going to expect you to include.

Let’s look at a quick outline of those three sections with their essential pieces here:

• Introduction paragraph with a thesis statement (which we just talked about)
• Support Point #1 with evidence
• Explain/interpret the evidence with your own, original commentary (AKA, the fun part!)
• Support Point #2 with evidence
• Explain/interpret the evidence with your own, original commentary
• Support Point #3 with evidence
• New paragraph addressing opposing viewpoints (more on this later!)
• Concluding paragraph

 Now, there are some key concepts in those sections that you’ve got to understand if you’re going to master how to write an argumentative essay. To make the most of the body section, you have to know how to support your claim (your thesis statement), what evidence and explanations are and when you should use them, and how and when to address opposing viewpoints. To finish strong, you’ve got to have a strategy for writing a stellar conclusion.

This probably feels like a big deal! The body and conclusion make up most of the essay, right? Let’s get down to it, then.

How to Write a Strong Argument

Once you have your topic and thesis, you’re ready for the hard part: actually writing your argument. If you make strategic choices—like the ones we’re about to talk about—writing a strong argumentative essay won’t feel so difficult.

There are three main areas where you want to focus your energy as you develop a strategy for how to write an argumentative essay: supporting your claim—your thesis statement—in your essay, addressing other viewpoints on your topic, and writing a solid conclusion. If you put thought and effort into these three things, you’re much more likely to write an argumentative essay that’s engaging, persuasive, and memorable...aka A+ material.

Focus Area 1: Supporting Your Claim With Evidence and Explanations

So you’ve chosen your topic, decided what your position will be, and written a thesis statement. But like we see in comment threads across the Internet, if you make a claim and don’t back it up with evidence, what do people say? “Where’s your proof?” “Show me the facts!” “Do you have any evidence to support that claim?”

Of course you’ve done your research like we talked about. Supporting your claim in your thesis statement is where that research comes in handy.

You can’t just use your research to state the facts, though. Remember your reader? They’re going to expect you to do some of the dirty work of interpreting the evidence for them. That’s why it’s important to know the difference between evidence and explanations, and how and when to use both in your argumentative essay.

What Evidence Is and When You Should Use It

Evidence can be material from any authoritative and credible outside source that supports your position on your topic. In some cases, evidence can come in the form of photos, video footage, or audio recordings. In other cases, you might be pulling reasons, facts, or statistics from news media articles, public policy, or scholarly books or journals.

There are some clues you can look for that indicate whether or not a source is credible , such as whether:

• The website where you found the source ends in .edu, .gov, or .org
• The source was published by a university press
• The source was published in a peer-reviewed journal
• The authors did extensive research to support the claims they make in the source

This is just a short list of some of the clues that a source is likely a credible one, but just because a source was published by a prestigious press or the authors all have PhDs doesn’t necessarily mean it is the best piece of evidence for you to use to support your argument.

In addition to evaluating the source’s credibility, you’ve got to consider what types of evidence might come across as most persuasive in the context of the argument you’re making and who your readers are. In other words, stepping back and getting a bird’s eye view of the entire context of your argumentative paper is key to choosing evidence that will strengthen your argument.

On some exams, like the AP exams , you may be given pretty strict parameters for what evidence to use and how to use it. You might be given six short readings that all address the same topic, have 15 minutes to read them, then be required to pull material from a minimum of three of the short readings to support your claim in an argumentative essay.

When the sources are handed to you like that, be sure to take notes that will help you pick out evidence as you read. Highlight, underline, put checkmarks in the margins of your exam . . . do whatever you need to do to begin identifying the material that you find most helpful or relevant. Those highlights and check marks might just turn into your quotes, paraphrases, or summaries of evidence in your completed exam essay.

What Explanations Are and When You Should Use Them

Now you know that taking a strategic mindset toward evidence and explanations is critical to grasping how to write an argumentative essay. Unfortunately, evidence doesn’t speak for itself. While it may be obvious to you, the researcher and writer, how the pieces of evidence you’ve included are relevant to your audience, it might not be as obvious to your reader.

That’s where explanations—or analysis, or interpretations—come in. You never want to just stick some quotes from an article into your paragraph and call it a day. You do want to interpret the evidence you’ve included to show your reader how that evidence supports your claim.

Now, that doesn’t mean you’re going to be saying, “This piece of evidence supports my argument because...”. Instead, you want to comment on the evidence in a way that helps your reader see how it supports the position you stated in your thesis. We’ll talk more about how to do this when we show you an example of a strong body paragraph from an argumentative essay here in a bit.

Understanding how to incorporate evidence and explanations to your advantage is really important. Here’s why: when you’re writing an argumentative essay, particularly on standardized tests or the AP exam, the exam scorers can’t penalize you for the position you take. Instead, their evaluation is going to focus on the way you incorporated evidence and explained it in your essay.

Focus Area 2: How—and When—to Address Other Viewpoints

Why would we be making arguments at all if there weren’t multiple views out there on a given topic? As you do research and consider the background surrounding your topic, you’ll probably come across arguments that stand in direct opposition to your position.

Oftentimes, teachers will ask you to “address the opposition” in your argumentative essay. What does that mean, though, to “ address the opposition ?”

Opposing viewpoints function kind of like an elephant in the room. Your audience knows they’re there. In fact, your audience might even buy into an opposing viewpoint and be waiting for you to show them why your viewpoint is better. If you don’t, it means that you’ll have a hard time convincing your audience to buy your argument.

Addressing the opposition is a balancing act: you don’t want to undermine your own argument, but you don’t want to dismiss the validity of opposing viewpoints out-of-hand or ignore them altogether, which can also undermine your argument.

This isn’t the only acceptable approach, but it’s common practice to wait to address the opposition until close to the end of an argumentative essay. But why?

Well, waiting to present an opposing viewpoint until after you’ve thoroughly supported your own argument is strategic. You aren’t going to go into great detail discussing the opposing viewpoint: you’re going to explain what that viewpoint is fairly, but you’re also going to point out what’s wrong with it.

It can also be effective to read the opposition through the lens of your own argument and the evidence you’ve used to support it. If the evidence you’ve already included supports your argument, it probably doesn’t support the opposing viewpoint. Without being too obvious, it might be worth pointing this out when you address the opposition.

Focus Area #3: Writing the Conclusion

It’s common to conclude an argumentative essay by reiterating the thesis statement in some way, either by reminding the reader what the overarching argument was in the first place or by reviewing the main points and evidence that you covered.

You don’t just want to restate your thesis statement and review your main points and call it a day, though. So much has happened since you stated your thesis in the introduction! And why waste a whole paragraph—the very last thing your audience is going to read—on just repeating yourself?

Here’s an approach to the conclusion that can give your audience a fresh perspective on your argument: reinterpret your thesis statement for them in light of all the evidence and explanations you’ve provided. Think about how your readers might read your thesis statement in a new light now that they’ve heard your whole argument out.

That’s what you want to leave your audience with as you conclude your argumentative paper: a brief explanation of why all that arguing mattered in the first place. If you can give your audience something to continue pondering after they’ve read your argument, that’s even better.

One thing you want to avoid in your conclusion, though: presenting new supporting points or new evidence. That can just be confusing for your reader. Stick to telling your reader why the argument you’ve already made matters, and your argument will stick with your reader.

A Strong Argumentative Essay: Examples

For some aspiring argumentative essay writers, showing is better than telling. To show rather than tell you what makes a strong argumentative essay, we’ve provided three examples of possible body paragraphs for an argumentative essay below.

Think of these example paragraphs as taking on the form of the “Argumentative Point #1 → Evidence —> Explanation —> Repeat” process we talked through earlier. It’s always nice to be able to compare examples, so we’ve included three paragraphs from an argumentative paper ranging from poor (or needs a lot of improvement, if you’re feeling generous), to better, to best.

All of the example paragraphs are for an essay with this thesis statement: 

Thesis Statement: In order to most effectively protect user data and combat the spread of disinformation, the U.S. government should implement more stringent regulations of Facebook and other social media outlets.

As you read the examples, think about what makes them different, and what makes the “best” paragraph more effective than the “better” and “poor” paragraphs. Here we go:

A Poor Argument

Example Body Paragraph: Data mining has affected a lot of people in recent years. Facebook has 2.23 billion users from around the world, and though it would take a huge amount of time and effort to make sure a company as big as Facebook was complying with privacy regulations in countries across the globe, adopting a common framework for privacy regulation in more countries would be the first step. In fact, Mark Zuckerberg himself supports adopting a global framework for privacy and data protection, which would protect more users than before.

What’s Wrong With This Example?

First, let’s look at the thesis statement. Ask yourself: does this make a claim that some people might agree with, but others might disagree with?

The answer is yes. Some people probably think that Facebook should be regulated, while others might believe that’s too much government intervention. Also, there are definitely good, reliable sources out there that will help this writer prove their argument. So this paper is off to a strong start!  

Unfortunately, this writer doesn’t do a great job proving their thesis in their body paragraph. First, the topic sentence—aka the first sentence of the paragraph—doesn’t make a point that directly supports the position stated in the thesis. We’re trying to argue that government regulation will help protect user data and combat the spread of misinformation, remember? The topic sentence should make a point that gets right at that, instead of throwing out a random fact about data mining.

Second, because the topic sentence isn’t focused on making a clear point, the rest of the paragraph doesn’t have much relevant information, and it fails to provide credible evidence that supports the claim made in the thesis statement. For example, it would be a great idea to include exactly what Mark Zuckerberg said ! So while there’s definitely some relevant information in this paragraph, it needs to be presented with more evidence.

A Better Argument  

This paragraph is a bit better than the first one, but it still needs some work. The topic sentence is a bit too long, and it doesn’t make a point that clearly supports the position laid out in the thesis statement. The reader already knows that mining user data is a big issue, so the topic sentence would be a great place to make a point about why more stringent government regulations would most effectively protect user data.

There’s also a problem with how the evidence is incorporated in this example. While there is some relevant, persuasive evidence included in this paragraph, there’s no explanation of why or how it is relevant . Remember, you can’t assume that your evidence speaks for itself: you have to interpret its relevance for your reader. That means including at least a sentence that tells your reader why the evidence you’ve chosen proves your argument.

A Best—But Not Perfect!—Argument  

Example Body Paragraph: Though Facebook claims to be implementing company policies that will protect user data and stop the spread of misinformation , its attempts have been unsuccessful compared to those made by the federal government. When PricewaterhouseCoopers conducted a Federal Trade Commission-mandated assessment of Facebook’s partnerships with Microsoft and the makers of the Blackberry handset in 2013, the team found limited evidence that Facebook had monitored or even checked that its partners had complied with Facebook’s existing data use policies. In fact, Facebook’s own auditors confirmed the PricewaterhouseCoopers findings, despite the fact that Facebook claimed that the company was making greater attempts to safeguard users’ personal information. In contrast, bills written by Congress have been more successful in changing Facebook’s practices than Facebook’s own company policies have. According to The Washington Post, The Honest Ads Act of 2017 “created public demand for transparency and changed how social media companies disclose online political advertising.” These policy efforts, though thus far unsuccessful in passing legislation, have nevertheless pushed social media companies to change some of their practices by sparking public outrage and negative media attention.

Why This Example Is The Best

This paragraph isn’t perfect, but it is the most effective at doing some of the things that you want to do when you write an argumentative essay.

First, the topic sentences get to the point . . . and it’s a point that supports and explains the claim made in the thesis statement! It gives a clear reason why our claim in favor of more stringent government regulations is a good claim : because Facebook has failed to self-regulate its practices.

This paragraph also provides strong evidence and specific examples that support the point made in the topic sentence. The evidence presented shows specific instances in which Facebook has failed to self-regulate, and other examples where the federal government has successfully influenced regulation of Facebook’s practices for the better.

Perhaps most importantly, though, this writer explains why the evidence is important. The bold sentence in the example is where the writer links the evidence back to their opinion. In this case, they explain that the pressure from Federal Trade Commission and Congress—and the threat of regulation—have helped change Facebook for the better.

Why point out that this isn’t a perfect paragraph, though? Because you won’t be writing perfect paragraphs when you’re taking timed exams either. But get this: you don’t have to write perfect paragraphs to make a good score on AP exams or even on an essay you write for class. Like in this example paragraph, you just have to effectively develop your position by appropriately and convincingly relying on evidence from good sources.

Top 3 Takeaways For Writing Argumentative Essays

This is all great information, right? If (when) you have to write an argumentative essay, you’ll be ready. But when in doubt, remember these three things about how to write an argumentative essay, and you’ll emerge victorious:

Takeaway #1: Read Closely and Carefully

This tip applies to every aspect of writing an argumentative essay. From making sure you’re addressing your prompt, to really digging into your sources, to proofreading your final paper...you’ll need to actively and pay attention! This is especially true if you’re writing on the clock, like during an AP exam.

Takeaway #2: Make Your Argument the Focus of the Essay

Define your position clearly in your thesis statement and stick to that position! The thesis is the backbone of your paper, and every paragraph should help prove your thesis in one way or another. But sometimes you get to the end of your essay and realize that you’ve gotten off topic, or that your thesis doesn’t quite fit. Don’t worry—if that happens, you can always rewrite your thesis to fit your paper!

Takeaway #3: Use Sources to Develop Your Argument—and Explain Them

Nothing is as powerful as good, strong evidence. First, make sure you’re finding credible sources that support your argument. Then you can paraphrase, briefly summarize, or quote from your sources as you incorporate them into your paragraphs. But remember the most important part: you have to explain why you’ve chosen that evidence and why it proves your thesis.

What's Next?

Once you’re comfortable with how to write an argumentative essay, it’s time to learn some more advanced tips and tricks for putting together a killer argument.

Keep in mind that argumentative essays are just one type of essay you might encounter. That’s why we’ve put together more specific guides on how to tackle IB essays , SAT essays , and ACT essays .

But what about admissions essays? We’ve got you covered. Not only do we have comprehensive guides to the Coalition App and Common App essays, we also have tons of individual college application guides, too . You can search through all of our college-specific posts by clicking here.

Ashley Sufflé Robinson has a Ph.D. in 19th Century English Literature. As a content writer for PrepScholar, Ashley is passionate about giving college-bound students the in-depth information they need to get into the school of their dreams.

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What is an Argumentative Essay? How to Write It (With Examples)

We define an argumentative essay as a type of essay that presents arguments about both sides of an issue. The purpose is to convince the reader to accept a particular viewpoint or action. In an argumentative essay, the writer takes a stance on a controversial or debatable topic and supports their position with evidence, reasoning, and examples. The essay should also address counterarguments, demonstrating a thorough understanding of the topic.

Table of Contents

• What is an argumentative essay?  
• Argumentative essay structure 
• Argumentative essay outline 
• Types of argument claims 

How to write an argumentative essay?

• Argumentative essay writing tips 
• Good argumentative essay example 

How to write a good thesis

• How to Write an Argumentative Essay with Paperpal? 

Frequently Asked Questions

What is an argumentative essay.

An argumentative essay is a type of writing that presents a coherent and logical analysis of a specific topic. 1 The goal is to convince the reader to accept the writer’s point of view or opinion on a particular issue. Here are the key elements of an argumentative essay: 

• Thesis Statement : The central claim or argument that the essay aims to prove. 
• Introduction : Provides background information and introduces the thesis statement. 
• Body Paragraphs : Each paragraph addresses a specific aspect of the argument, presents evidence, and may include counter arguments. 

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• Evidence : Supports the main argument with relevant facts, examples, statistics, or expert opinions. 
• Counterarguments : Anticipates and addresses opposing viewpoints to strengthen the overall argument. 
• Conclusion : Summarizes the main points, reinforces the thesis, and may suggest implications or actions. 

Argumentative essay structure

Aristotelian, Rogerian, and Toulmin are three distinct approaches to argumentative essay structures, each with its principles and methods. 2 The choice depends on the purpose and nature of the topic. Here’s an overview of each type of argumentative essay format.

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Argumentative essay outline

An argumentative essay presents a specific claim or argument and supports it with evidence and reasoning. Here’s an outline for an argumentative essay, along with examples for each section: 3  

1.  Introduction : 

• Hook : Start with a compelling statement, question, or anecdote to grab the reader’s attention. 

Example: “Did you know that plastic pollution is threatening marine life at an alarming rate?” 

• Background information : Provide brief context about the issue. 

Example: “Plastic pollution has become a global environmental concern, with millions of tons of plastic waste entering our oceans yearly.” 

• Thesis statement : Clearly state your main argument or position. 

Example: “We must take immediate action to reduce plastic usage and implement more sustainable alternatives to protect our marine ecosystem.” 

2.  Body Paragraphs : 

• Topic sentence : Introduce the main idea of each paragraph. 

Example: “The first step towards addressing the plastic pollution crisis is reducing single-use plastic consumption.” 

• Evidence/Support : Provide evidence, facts, statistics, or examples that support your argument. 

Example: “Research shows that plastic straws alone contribute to millions of tons of plastic waste annually, and many marine animals suffer from ingestion or entanglement.” 

• Counterargument/Refutation : Acknowledge and refute opposing viewpoints. 

Example: “Some argue that banning plastic straws is inconvenient for consumers, but the long-term environmental benefits far outweigh the temporary inconvenience.” 

• Transition : Connect each paragraph to the next. 

Example: “Having addressed the issue of single-use plastics, the focus must now shift to promoting sustainable alternatives.” 

3.  Counterargument Paragraph : 

• Acknowledgement of opposing views : Recognize alternative perspectives on the issue. 

Example: “While some may argue that individual actions cannot significantly impact global plastic pollution, the cumulative effect of collective efforts must be considered.” 

• Counterargument and rebuttal : Present and refute the main counterargument. 

Example: “However, individual actions, when multiplied across millions of people, can substantially reduce plastic waste. Small changes in behavior, such as using reusable bags and containers, can have a significant positive impact.” 

4.  Conclusion : 

• Restatement of thesis : Summarize your main argument. 

Example: “In conclusion, adopting sustainable practices and reducing single-use plastic is crucial for preserving our oceans and marine life.” 

• Call to action : Encourage the reader to take specific steps or consider the argument’s implications. 

Example: “It is our responsibility to make environmentally conscious choices and advocate for policies that prioritize the health of our planet. By collectively embracing sustainable alternatives, we can contribute to a cleaner and healthier future.” 

Types of argument claims

A claim is a statement or proposition a writer puts forward with evidence to persuade the reader. 4 Here are some common types of argument claims, along with examples: 

• Fact Claims : These claims assert that something is true or false and can often be verified through evidence.  Example: “Water boils at 100°C at sea level.”
• Value Claims : Value claims express judgments about the worth or morality of something, often based on personal beliefs or societal values. Example: “Organic farming is more ethical than conventional farming.” 
• Policy Claims : Policy claims propose a course of action or argue for a specific policy, law, or regulation change.  Example: “Schools should adopt a year-round education system to improve student learning outcomes.” 
• Cause and Effect Claims : These claims argue that one event or condition leads to another, establishing a cause-and-effect relationship.  Example: “Excessive use of social media is a leading cause of increased feelings of loneliness among young adults.” 
• Definition Claims : Definition claims assert the meaning or classification of a concept or term.  Example: “Artificial intelligence can be defined as machines exhibiting human-like cognitive functions.” 
• Comparative Claims : Comparative claims assert that one thing is better or worse than another in certain respects.  Example: “Online education is more cost-effective than traditional classroom learning.” 
• Evaluation Claims : Evaluation claims assess the quality, significance, or effectiveness of something based on specific criteria.  Example: “The new healthcare policy is more effective in providing affordable healthcare to all citizens.” 

Understanding these argument claims can help writers construct more persuasive and well-supported arguments tailored to the specific nature of the claim.  

If you’re wondering how to start an argumentative essay, here’s a step-by-step guide to help you with the argumentative essay format and writing process.

• Choose a Topic: Select a topic that you are passionate about or interested in. Ensure that the topic is debatable and has two or more sides.
• Define Your Position: Clearly state your stance on the issue. Consider opposing viewpoints and be ready to counter them.
• Conduct Research: Gather relevant information from credible sources, such as books, articles, and academic journals. Take notes on key points and supporting evidence.
• Create a Thesis Statement: Develop a concise and clear thesis statement that outlines your main argument. Convey your position on the issue and provide a roadmap for the essay.
• Outline Your Argumentative Essay: Organize your ideas logically by creating an outline. Include an introduction, body paragraphs, and a conclusion. Each body paragraph should focus on a single point that supports your thesis.
• Write the Introduction: Start with a hook to grab the reader’s attention (a quote, a question, a surprising fact). Provide background information on the topic. Present your thesis statement at the end of the introduction.
• Develop Body Paragraphs: Begin each paragraph with a clear topic sentence that relates to the thesis. Support your points with evidence and examples. Address counterarguments and refute them to strengthen your position. Ensure smooth transitions between paragraphs.
• Address Counterarguments: Acknowledge and respond to opposing viewpoints. Anticipate objections and provide evidence to counter them.
• Write the Conclusion: Summarize the main points of your argumentative essay. Reinforce the significance of your argument. End with a call to action, a prediction, or a thought-provoking statement.
• Revise, Edit, and Share: Review your essay for clarity, coherence, and consistency. Check for grammatical and spelling errors. Share your essay with peers, friends, or instructors for constructive feedback.
• Finalize Your Argumentative Essay: Make final edits based on feedback received. Ensure that your essay follows the required formatting and citation style.

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Argumentative essay writing tips

Here are eight strategies to craft a compelling argumentative essay: 

• Choose a Clear and Controversial Topic : Select a topic that sparks debate and has opposing viewpoints. A clear and controversial issue provides a solid foundation for a strong argument. 
• Conduct Thorough Research : Gather relevant information from reputable sources to support your argument. Use a variety of sources, such as academic journals, books, reputable websites, and expert opinions, to strengthen your position. 
• Create a Strong Thesis Statement : Clearly articulate your main argument in a concise thesis statement. Your thesis should convey your stance on the issue and provide a roadmap for the reader to follow your argument. 
• Develop a Logical Structure : Organize your essay with a clear introduction, body paragraphs, and conclusion. Each paragraph should focus on a specific point of evidence that contributes to your overall argument. Ensure a logical flow from one point to the next. 
• Provide Strong Evidence : Support your claims with solid evidence. Use facts, statistics, examples, and expert opinions to support your arguments. Be sure to cite your sources appropriately to maintain credibility. 
• Address Counterarguments : Acknowledge opposing viewpoints and counterarguments. Addressing and refuting alternative perspectives strengthens your essay and demonstrates a thorough understanding of the issue. Be mindful of maintaining a respectful tone even when discussing opposing views. 
• Use Persuasive Language : Employ persuasive language to make your points effectively. Avoid emotional appeals without supporting evidence and strive for a respectful and professional tone. 
• Craft a Compelling Conclusion : Summarize your main points, restate your thesis, and leave a lasting impression in your conclusion. Encourage readers to consider the implications of your argument and potentially take action. 

Good argumentative essay example

Let’s consider a sample of argumentative essay on how social media enhances connectivity:

In the digital age, social media has emerged as a powerful tool that transcends geographical boundaries, connecting individuals from diverse backgrounds and providing a platform for an array of voices to be heard. While critics argue that social media fosters division and amplifies negativity, it is essential to recognize the positive aspects of this digital revolution and how it enhances connectivity by providing a platform for diverse voices to flourish. One of the primary benefits of social media is its ability to facilitate instant communication and connection across the globe. Platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram break down geographical barriers, enabling people to establish and maintain relationships regardless of physical location and fostering a sense of global community. Furthermore, social media has transformed how people stay connected with friends and family. Whether separated by miles or time zones, social media ensures that relationships remain dynamic and relevant, contributing to a more interconnected world. Moreover, social media has played a pivotal role in giving voice to social justice movements and marginalized communities. Movements such as #BlackLivesMatter, #MeToo, and #ClimateStrike have gained momentum through social media, allowing individuals to share their stories and advocate for change on a global scale. This digital activism can shape public opinion and hold institutions accountable. Social media platforms provide a dynamic space for open dialogue and discourse. Users can engage in discussions, share information, and challenge each other’s perspectives, fostering a culture of critical thinking. This open exchange of ideas contributes to a more informed and enlightened society where individuals can broaden their horizons and develop a nuanced understanding of complex issues. While criticisms of social media abound, it is crucial to recognize its positive impact on connectivity and the amplification of diverse voices. Social media transcends physical and cultural barriers, connecting people across the globe and providing a platform for marginalized voices to be heard. By fostering open dialogue and facilitating the exchange of ideas, social media contributes to a more interconnected and empowered society. Embracing the positive aspects of social media allows us to harness its potential for positive change and collective growth.

• Clearly Define Your Thesis Statement:   Your thesis statement is the core of your argumentative essay. Clearly articulate your main argument or position on the issue. Avoid vague or general statements.  
• Provide Strong Supporting Evidence:   Back up your thesis with solid evidence from reliable sources and examples. This can include facts, statistics, expert opinions, anecdotes, or real-life examples. Make sure your evidence is relevant to your argument, as it impacts the overall persuasiveness of your thesis.  
• Anticipate Counterarguments and Address Them:   Acknowledge and address opposing viewpoints to strengthen credibility. This also shows that you engage critically with the topic rather than presenting a one-sided argument. 

How to Write an Argumentative Essay with Paperpal?

Writing a winning argumentative essay not only showcases your ability to critically analyze a topic but also demonstrates your skill in persuasively presenting your stance backed by evidence. Achieving this level of writing excellence can be time-consuming. This is where Paperpal, your AI academic writing assistant, steps in to revolutionize the way you approach argumentative essays. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to use Paperpal to write your essay: 

• Sign Up or Log In: Begin by creating an account or logging into paperpal.com .  
• Navigate to Paperpal Copilot: Once logged in, proceed to the Templates section from the side navigation bar.  
• Generate an essay outline: Under Templates, click on the ‘Outline’ tab and choose ‘Essay’ from the options and provide your topic to generate an outline.  
• Develop your essay: Use this structured outline as a guide to flesh out your essay. If you encounter any roadblocks, click on Brainstorm and get subject-specific assistance, ensuring you stay on track. 
• Refine your writing: To elevate the academic tone of your essay, select a paragraph and use the ‘Make Academic’ feature under the ‘Rewrite’ tab, ensuring your argumentative essay resonates with an academic audience. 
• Final Touches: Make your argumentative essay submission ready with Paperpal’s language, grammar, consistency and plagiarism checks, and improve your chances of acceptance.  

Paperpal not only simplifies the essay writing process but also ensures your argumentative essay is persuasive, well-structured, and academically rigorous. Sign up today and transform how you write argumentative essays. 

The length of an argumentative essay can vary, but it typically falls within the range of 1,000 to 2,500 words. However, the specific requirements may depend on the guidelines provided.

You might write an argumentative essay when:  1. You want to convince others of the validity of your position.  2. There is a controversial or debatable issue that requires discussion.  3. You need to present evidence and logical reasoning to support your claims.  4. You want to explore and critically analyze different perspectives on a topic. 

Argumentative Essay:  Purpose : An argumentative essay aims to persuade the reader to accept or agree with a specific point of view or argument.  Structure : It follows a clear structure with an introduction, thesis statement, body paragraphs presenting arguments and evidence, counterarguments and refutations, and a conclusion.  Tone : The tone is formal and relies on logical reasoning, evidence, and critical analysis.    Narrative/Descriptive Essay:  Purpose : These aim to tell a story or describe an experience, while a descriptive essay focuses on creating a vivid picture of a person, place, or thing.  Structure : They may have a more flexible structure. They often include an engaging introduction, a well-developed body that builds the story or description, and a conclusion.  Tone : The tone is more personal and expressive to evoke emotions or provide sensory details. 

• Gladd, J. (2020). Tips for Writing Academic Persuasive Essays.  Write What Matters . 
• Nimehchisalem, V. (2018). Pyramid of argumentation: Towards an integrated model for teaching and assessing ESL writing.  Language & Communication ,  5 (2), 185-200. 
• Press, B. (2022).  Argumentative Essays: A Step-by-Step Guide . Broadview Press. 
• Rieke, R. D., Sillars, M. O., & Peterson, T. R. (2005).  Argumentation and critical decision making . Pearson/Allyn & Bacon. 

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Praxis Core Writing

Course: praxis core writing   >   unit 1, argumentative essay | quick guide.

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Argumentative essay (30 minutes)

• states or clearly implies the writer’s position or thesis
• organizes and develops ideas logically, making insightful connections between them
• clearly explains key ideas, supporting them with well-chosen reasons, examples, or details
• displays effective sentence variety
• clearly displays facility in the use of language
• is generally free from errors in grammar, usage, and mechanics
• organizes and develops ideas clearly, making connections between them
• explains key ideas, supporting them with relevant reasons, examples, or details
• displays some sentence variety
• displays facility in the use of language
• states or implies the writer’s position or thesis
• shows control in the organization and development of ideas
• explains some key ideas, supporting them with adequate reasons, examples, or details
• displays adequate use of language
• shows control of grammar, usage, and mechanics, but may display errors
• limited in stating or implying a position or thesis
• limited control in the organization and development of ideas
• inadequate reasons, examples, or details to explain key ideas
• an accumulation of errors in the use of language
• an accumulation of errors in grammar, usage, and mechanics
• no clear position or thesis
• weak organization or very little development
• few or no relevant reasons, examples, or details
• frequent serious errors in the use of language
• frequent serious errors in grammar, usage, and mechanics
• contains serious and persistent writing errors or
• is incoherent or
• is undeveloped or
• is off-topic

How should I build a thesis?

• (Choice A)   Kids should find role models that are worthier than celebrities because celebrities may be famous for reasons that aren't admirable. A Kids should find role models that are worthier than celebrities because celebrities may be famous for reasons that aren't admirable.
• (Choice B)   Because they profit from the admiration of youths, celebrities have a moral responsibility for the reactions their behaviors provoke in fans. B Because they profit from the admiration of youths, celebrities have a moral responsibility for the reactions their behaviors provoke in fans.
• (Choice C)   Celebrities may have more imitators than most people, but they hold no more responsibility over the example they set than the average person. C Celebrities may have more imitators than most people, but they hold no more responsibility over the example they set than the average person.
• (Choice D)   Notoriety is not always a choice, and some celebrities may not want to be role models. D Notoriety is not always a choice, and some celebrities may not want to be role models.
• (Choice E)   Parents have a moral responsibility to serve as immediate role models for their children. E Parents have a moral responsibility to serve as immediate role models for their children.

How should I support my thesis?

• (Choice A)   As basketball star Charles Barkley stated in a famous advertising campaign for Nike, he was paid to dominate on the basketball court, not to raise your kids. A As basketball star Charles Barkley stated in a famous advertising campaign for Nike, he was paid to dominate on the basketball court, not to raise your kids.
• (Choice B)   Many celebrities do consider themselves responsible for setting a good example and create non-profit organizations through which they can benefit youths. B Many celebrities do consider themselves responsible for setting a good example and create non-profit organizations through which they can benefit youths.
• (Choice C)   Many celebrities, like Kylie Jenner with her billion-dollar cosmetics company, profit directly from being imitated by fans who purchase sponsored products. C Many celebrities, like Kylie Jenner with her billion-dollar cosmetics company, profit directly from being imitated by fans who purchase sponsored products.
• (Choice D)   My ten-year-old nephew may love Drake's music, but his behaviors are more similar to those of the adults he interacts with on a daily basis, like his parents and teachers. D My ten-year-old nephew may love Drake's music, but his behaviors are more similar to those of the adults he interacts with on a daily basis, like his parents and teachers.
• (Choice E)   It's very common for young people to wear fashions similar to those of their favorite celebrities. E It's very common for young people to wear fashions similar to those of their favorite celebrities.

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What this handout is about

This handout will define what an argument is and explain why you need one in most of your academic essays.

Arguments are everywhere

You may be surprised to hear that the word “argument” does not have to be written anywhere in your assignment for it to be an important part of your task. In fact, making an argument—expressing a point of view on a subject and supporting it with evidence—is often the aim of academic writing. Your instructors may assume that you know this and thus may not explain the importance of arguments in class.

Most material you learn in college is or has been debated by someone, somewhere, at some time. Even when the material you read or hear is presented as a simple fact, it may actually be one person’s interpretation of a set of information. Instructors may call on you to examine that interpretation and defend it, refute it, or offer some new view of your own. In writing assignments, you will almost always need to do more than just summarize information that you have gathered or regurgitate facts that have been discussed in class. You will need to develop a point of view on or interpretation of that material and provide evidence for your position.

Consider an example. For nearly 2000 years, educated people in many Western cultures believed that bloodletting—deliberately causing a sick person to lose blood—was the most effective treatment for a variety of illnesses. The claim that bloodletting is beneficial to human health was not widely questioned until the 1800s, and some physicians continued to recommend bloodletting as late as the 1920s. Medical practices have now changed because some people began to doubt the effectiveness of bloodletting; these people argued against it and provided convincing evidence. Human knowledge grows out of such differences of opinion, and scholars like your instructors spend their lives engaged in debate over what claims may be counted as accurate in their fields. In their courses, they want you to engage in similar kinds of critical thinking and debate.

Argumentation is not just what your instructors do. We all use argumentation on a daily basis, and you probably already have some skill at crafting an argument. The more you improve your skills in this area, the better you will be at thinking critically, reasoning, making choices, and weighing evidence.

Making a claim

What is an argument? In academic writing, an argument is usually a main idea, often called a “claim” or “thesis statement,” backed up with evidence that supports the idea. In the majority of college papers, you will need to make some sort of claim and use evidence to support it, and your ability to do this well will separate your papers from those of students who see assignments as mere accumulations of fact and detail. In other words, gone are the happy days of being given a “topic” about which you can write anything. It is time to stake out a position and prove why it is a good position for a thinking person to hold. See our handout on thesis statements .

Claims can be as simple as “Protons are positively charged and electrons are negatively charged,” with evidence such as, “In this experiment, protons and electrons acted in such and such a way.” Claims can also be as complex as “Genre is the most important element to the contract of expectations between filmmaker and audience,” using reasoning and evidence such as, “defying genre expectations can create a complete apocalypse of story form and content, leaving us stranded in a sort of genre-less abyss.” In either case, the rest of your paper will detail the reasoning and evidence that have led you to believe that your position is best.

When beginning to write a paper, ask yourself, “What is my point?” For example, the point of this handout is to help you become a better writer, and we are arguing that an important step in the process of writing effective arguments is understanding the concept of argumentation. If your papers do not have a main point, they cannot be arguing for anything. Asking yourself what your point is can help you avoid a mere “information dump.” Consider this: your instructors probably know a lot more than you do about your subject matter. Why, then, would you want to provide them with material they already know? Instructors are usually looking for two things:

• Proof that you understand the material
• A demonstration of your ability to use or apply the material in ways that go beyond what you have read or heard.

This second part can be done in many ways: you can critique the material, apply it to something else, or even just explain it in a different way. In order to succeed at this second step, though, you must have a particular point to argue.

Arguments in academic writing are usually complex and take time to develop. Your argument will need to be more than a simple or obvious statement such as “Frank Lloyd Wright was a great architect.” Such a statement might capture your initial impressions of Wright as you have studied him in class; however, you need to look deeper and express specifically what caused that “greatness.” Your instructor will probably expect something more complicated, such as “Frank Lloyd Wright’s architecture combines elements of European modernism, Asian aesthetic form, and locally found materials to create a unique new style,” or “There are many strong similarities between Wright’s building designs and those of his mother, which suggests that he may have borrowed some of her ideas.” To develop your argument, you would then define your terms and prove your claim with evidence from Wright’s drawings and buildings and those of the other architects you mentioned.

Do not stop with having a point. You have to back up your point with evidence. The strength of your evidence, and your use of it, can make or break your argument. See our handout on evidence . You already have the natural inclination for this type of thinking, if not in an academic setting. Think about how you talked your parents into letting you borrow the family car. Did you present them with lots of instances of your past trustworthiness? Did you make them feel guilty because your friends’ parents all let them drive? Did you whine until they just wanted you to shut up? Did you look up statistics on teen driving and use them to show how you didn’t fit the dangerous-driver profile? These are all types of argumentation, and they exist in academia in similar forms.

Every field has slightly different requirements for acceptable evidence, so familiarize yourself with some arguments from within that field instead of just applying whatever evidence you like best. Pay attention to your textbooks and your instructor’s lectures. What types of argument and evidence are they using? The type of evidence that sways an English instructor may not work to convince a sociology instructor. Find out what counts as proof that something is true in that field. Is it statistics, a logical development of points, something from the object being discussed (art work, text, culture, or atom), the way something works, or some combination of more than one of these things?

Be consistent with your evidence. Unlike negotiating for the use of your parents’ car, a college paper is not the place for an all-out blitz of every type of argument. You can often use more than one type of evidence within a paper, but make sure that within each section you are providing the reader with evidence appropriate to each claim. So, if you start a paragraph or section with a statement like “Putting the student seating area closer to the basketball court will raise player performance,” do not follow with your evidence on how much more money the university could raise by letting more students go to games for free. Information about how fan support raises player morale, which then results in better play, would be a better follow-up. Your next section could offer clear reasons why undergraduates have as much or more right to attend an undergraduate event as wealthy alumni—but this information would not go in the same section as the fan support stuff. You cannot convince a confused person, so keep things tidy and ordered.

Counterargument

One way to strengthen your argument and show that you have a deep understanding of the issue you are discussing is to anticipate and address counterarguments or objections. By considering what someone who disagrees with your position might have to say about your argument, you show that you have thought things through, and you dispose of some of the reasons your audience might have for not accepting your argument. Recall our discussion of student seating in the Dean Dome. To make the most effective argument possible, you should consider not only what students would say about seating but also what alumni who have paid a lot to get good seats might say.

You can generate counterarguments by asking yourself how someone who disagrees with you might respond to each of the points you’ve made or your position as a whole. If you can’t immediately imagine another position, here are some strategies to try:

• Do some research. It may seem to you that no one could possibly disagree with the position you are arguing, but someone probably has. For example, some people argue that a hotdog is a sandwich. If you are making an argument concerning, for example, the characteristics of an exceptional sandwich, you might want to see what some of these people have to say.
• Talk with a friend or with your teacher. Another person may be able to imagine counterarguments that haven’t occurred to you.
• Consider your conclusion or claim and the premises of your argument and imagine someone who denies each of them. For example, if you argued, “Cats make the best pets. This is because they are clean and independent,” you might imagine someone saying, “Cats do not make the best pets. They are dirty and needy.”

Once you have thought up some counterarguments, consider how you will respond to them—will you concede that your opponent has a point but explain why your audience should nonetheless accept your argument? Will you reject the counterargument and explain why it is mistaken? Either way, you will want to leave your reader with a sense that your argument is stronger than opposing arguments.

When you are summarizing opposing arguments, be charitable. Present each argument fairly and objectively, rather than trying to make it look foolish. You want to show that you have considered the many sides of the issue. If you simply attack or caricature your opponent (also referred to as presenting a “straw man”), you suggest that your argument is only capable of defeating an extremely weak adversary, which may undermine your argument rather than enhance it.

It is usually better to consider one or two serious counterarguments in some depth, rather than to give a long but superficial list of many different counterarguments and replies.

Be sure that your reply is consistent with your original argument. If considering a counterargument changes your position, you will need to go back and revise your original argument accordingly.

Audience is a very important consideration in argument. Take a look at our handout on audience . A lifetime of dealing with your family members has helped you figure out which arguments work best to persuade each of them. Maybe whining works with one parent, but the other will only accept cold, hard statistics. Your kid brother may listen only to the sound of money in his palm. It’s usually wise to think of your audience in an academic setting as someone who is perfectly smart but who doesn’t necessarily agree with you. You are not just expressing your opinion in an argument (“It’s true because I said so”), and in most cases your audience will know something about the subject at hand—so you will need sturdy proof. At the same time, do not think of your audience as capable of reading your mind. You have to come out and state both your claim and your evidence clearly. Do not assume that because the instructor knows the material, he or she understands what part of it you are using, what you think about it, and why you have taken the position you’ve chosen.

Critical reading

Critical reading is a big part of understanding argument. Although some of the material you read will be very persuasive, do not fall under the spell of the printed word as authority. Very few of your instructors think of the texts they assign as the last word on the subject. Remember that the author of every text has an agenda, something that he or she wants you to believe. This is OK—everything is written from someone’s perspective—but it’s a good thing to be aware of. For more information on objectivity and bias and on reading sources carefully, read our handouts on evaluating print sources and reading to write .

Take notes either in the margins of your source (if you are using a photocopy or your own book) or on a separate sheet as you read. Put away that highlighter! Simply highlighting a text is good for memorizing the main ideas in that text—it does not encourage critical reading. Part of your goal as a reader should be to put the author’s ideas in your own words. Then you can stop thinking of these ideas as facts and start thinking of them as arguments.

When you read, ask yourself questions like “What is the author trying to prove?” and “What is the author assuming I will agree with?” Do you agree with the author? Does the author adequately defend her argument? What kind of proof does she use? Is there something she leaves out that you would put in? Does putting it in hurt her argument? As you get used to reading critically, you will start to see the sometimes hidden agendas of other writers, and you can use this skill to improve your own ability to craft effective arguments.

Works consulted

We consulted these works while writing this handout. This is not a comprehensive list of resources on the handout’s topic, and we encourage you to do your own research to find additional publications. Please do not use this list as a model for the format of your own reference list, as it may not match the citation style you are using. For guidance on formatting citations, please see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial . We revise these tips periodically and welcome feedback.

Anson, Chris M., and Robert A. Schwegler. 2010. The Longman Handbook for Writers and Readers , 6th ed. New York: Longman.

Booth, Wayne C., Gregory G. Colomb, Joseph M. Williams, Joseph Bizup, and William T. FitzGerald. 2016. The Craft of Research , 4th ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Ede, Lisa. 2004. Work in Progress: A Guide to Academic Writing and Revising , 6th ed. Boston: Bedford/St Martin’s.

Gage, John T. 2005. The Shape of Reason: Argumentative Writing in College , 4th ed. New York: Longman.

Lunsford, Andrea A., and John J. Ruszkiewicz. 2016. Everything’s an Argument , 7th ed. Boston: Bedford/St Martin’s.

Rosen, Leonard J., and Laurence Behrens. 2003. The Allyn & Bacon Handbook , 5th ed. New York: Longman.

You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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How to Write an Argumentative Essay: 101 Guide [+ Examples]

An argumentative essay is a genre of academic writing that investigates different sides of a particular issue. Its central purpose is to inform the readers rather than expressively persuade them. Thus, it is crucial to differentiate between argumentative and persuasive essays.

While composing an argumentative essay, the students have to demonstrate their research and analytical skills. The secret of a successful paper lies behind strong arguments and counterarguments. So, the writer should focus on facts and data rather than personal values and beliefs.

Besides, a good argumentative essay should be structured appropriately:

• The introduction and conclusion have to create a frame for the entire essay.
• The body paragraphs are supposed to cover the essential points.
• Supporting evidence should make a paper more professional and reputable.

Are you still wondering what an argumentative essay is and how to write it? Check out the sections below prepared by our experts . Here, you can find the most valuable info, helpful tips, and useful examples.

📜 Classic Strategy

📋 toulmin strategy, 🗣️ rogerian strategy, ✒️ fill in the blanks, 🔍 edit and proofread, 🔗 references, 📌 argumentative essay in a nutshell.

Are you trying to figure out what an argumentative essay is? It’s a type of academic paper that covers both sides of a given issue. An author can decide whether they aim to present both sides equally or support one side more dynamically.

One of the mistakes among students is the confusion of argumentative and persuasive essays . Do you want to figure out the differences? Take a look at the following table.

Before writing an argument essay, it would be helpful to choose an appropriate model to rely on. There are three strategies to consider: Classical, Toulmin, and Rogerian.

Look at the following sections and choose the most suitable one for you.

Are you wondering how to write an argumentative essay? Consider using the classical approach. It is the most popular way of composing an argumentative paper.

Under the classical strategy, the author has to follow these rules:

• research the issue;
• present both sides;
• express own opinion;
• prove the reader the validity of the conclusion.

It is up to the audience to decide whether your position is right or wrong. Yet, you should try to convince the readers of the effectiveness of your opinion.

Usually, the classical argument paper is structured in the following way:

• Introduction . Use the hook to catch the readers’ attention. State the problem and explain why your topic is relatable to the audience.
• General background. Introduce the general info and several facts about your issue.
• Thesis statement . State your position clearly and concisely.
• The central argument. Provide valid evidence and appropriate examples to support your position. Refer only to reliable sources.
• Rebuttal . Include a counter paragraph in your essay, presenting the opposing arguments. Provide specific examples to make the reader understand your position. Also, explain to the audience why the counterclaims are incorrect.
• Conclusion . Synthesize your arguments and counterarguments. Give the readers a question for further investigation of your problem. To make your essay more impressive, compose a memorable concluding sentence.

Toulmin strategy is the most suitable for the discussion of controversial issues. This model aims to find common ground through clear logic and valid evidence. Besides, the Toulmin strategy eliminates unnecessary things and limits the points to agree upon.

An argumentative essay written by the Toulmin model includes the following elements:

• Claim . A viewpoint that the author aims to prove.
• Evidence . Supportive facts from reliable resources that highlight the significance of the claim.
• Warrant . An element that connects the claim and that evidence.
• Backing . Additional reasoning that underlines the warrant’s validity.
• Rebuttal . Counterarguments that contradict the author’s position.
• Qualifier . An additional element (usually, a word or a short phrase) that narrows the claim’s capacity. Several examples of qualifiers: “typically,” “usually,” “occasionally,” etc.
• Exceptions . Specific limitations that indicate the cases where that claim may not be valid.

Like the Toulmin approach, Rogerian strategy attempts to find common ground between two sides of one issue. However, the technique is slightly different.

The Rogerian model is often used in highly controversial debates when the parties do not accept each other’s position. Thus, the given strategy focuses on finding the agreement by proving the validity of the opposing arguments.

Below, you can find the primary outline for the Rogerian argumentative essay:

• Introduce the problem. Present the issue clearly and explain why it is worth the readers’ attention.
• Summarize and analyze the counterarguments. Take into consideration all the possible counterpoints and look at them from different perspectives. Discuss the cases in which the opposing claims could be valid. Demonstrate your open-mindedness. This will make the opposite party more loyal to you.
• Present your position. After discussing the counterpoints, state your opinion. Convince the audience about the validity of your points.
• Prove the advantages of your position. Explain to the opposite party how the acceptance and adoption of your points will benefit them.

🧐 How to Write an Argumentative Essay

Before working on your essay, carefully read the assignment. Make sure you understand all the instructor’s requirements and the purpose of the paper.

• Pay enough attention to the task. Did your professor assign you a topic? Or do you need to choose it yourself ? Make sure you have an idea that will turn into an outstanding essay.
• Select the strategy you are going to apply. An argumentative essay format will depend on the model you choose to compose your paper. Analyze the issue you will arise and decide what strategy is the most suitable. Is it the Classical model, the Toulmin, or the Rogerian one?

After that, start composing your argumentative essay. Check out the following sections. We have a lot of insightful info to share with you!

📚 Research the Topic

The first step of writing an argumentative paper is an in-depth investigation of the topic. To validate your arguments, you have to refer to credible resources. The essay will look more professional if you use reliable sources in it.

To research like a professional , do the following:

• Use only credible sources. You can refer to the books, research articles, materials from academic databases, or Google Scholar. Webpages registered as governmental or educational institutions (.gov, .edu.) and widely-known news websites (New York Times, BBC, CNBC) are also considered appropriate. Avoid using blog posts, outdated materials, and any other data from unreliable sources. You may get into huge trouble, taking information from random websites, since it may be invalid.
• Pay attention to the publishing date . You may be required to use the sources released no later than five years ago. Yet, it is not always the case, especially when you’re dealing with historical documents. Thus, double-check your instructions regarding recommended sources.
• Keep your topic in mind. Concentrate on what you are writing about and select the sources for your exact issue. Avoid sources that provide too general information and look for more limited ones. If your idea is World War II’s economic consequences, the history book from ancient times to modern days will not be the best option.
• Become an expert. Take enough time to investigate the issue you are writing about. Read numerous articles, compare and contrast the scientists’ opinions. Prove your reader that you are a reliable person who selected the best sources.

📝 Outline Your Essay

The majority of students tend to underestimate the power of outlining. Don’t do this! An argumentative essay outline is a helpful tool for planning, structuring, and composing.

Firstly , a well-developed outline helps the writer to put all their thoughts in an appropriate order. None of the essential points will be lost if the student plans the essay before writing.

Secondly , it lets the writer figure out what evidence suits what argument most. Before writing, draft your essay first. Put examples, facts, etc. in the right parts of the paper. Then, write the entire text.

Thirdly , an outline provides a perfect opportunity to change the essay’s parts without rewriting the paper. Are you unsure of specific details? Not a problem. Change them in the outline without ruining the text.

There are essential elements that your outline should contain. Check out the following section to see them.

Introduction

How to start an argumentative essay? First and foremost, include an argumentative essay introduction in your outline.

This part should grab the readers’ attention from the first words. Thus, put enough effort into composing a compelling hook . What can it be? An impressive statistic or an exciting fact? Be creative – decide yourself! But make sure that your intro is catchy enough.

After the hook, introduce your topic’s general background . Prove the readers the significance of your issue and gradually come to the thesis statement .

The concept of studying abroad is becoming increasingly popular in both developed and developing countries. Students around the globe strive to explore the world and broaden their minds, and studying in a foreign country is an excellent opportunity to do so. Such experience may be extremely beneficial because meeting new people and discovering foreign cultures help students to gain valuable knowledge and see the world from a new perspective. However, while presenting significant opportunities for personal growth, it may also bring about some challenges.

Thesis Statement

A thesis is an essential part of your argumentative essay. It should state your position regarding the issue clearly and concisely. Avoid general statements, vague words, and be as specific and possible. Your thesis statement should guide the readers throughout the main points of the paper.

The location of the thesis in the essay plays a crucial role. The most appropriate place for it is the last sentence of the introductory paragraph.

Although students face difficulties such as loneliness while studying abroad, it is a worthy experience to introduce them to new knowledge, people, and culture and promote their independence.

Body Paragraphs

The body of your paper is supposed to develop your position, provide valid evidence and examples. Each paragraph has to focus only on one idea. This will ensure the logical structure of your argumentative essay.

A body paragraph should start from the topic sentence and end with the concluding sentence . Such a frame around every section will make your readers stay concentrated on your ideas and get your opinion.

• The topic sentence is the first sentence of the passage. It should reflect its point and correspond to the thesis statement.
• The concluding sentence aims to wrap up the author’s thoughts. Thus, make sure that the last sentence of a paragraph is insightful enough.

Each body paragraph should include an argument (or a counterargument) with supporting evidence. Get your proof from credible sources and ensure that it directly corresponds to the point.

An example of a topic sentence :

The benefits of education abroad are almost innumerable, prominent examples being gaining new knowledge, making friends with people who have different mindsets, and discovering new cultures.

An example of a concluding sentence:

Participants of student exchange programs usually return more driven and eager to develop both themselves and their country.

A conclusion plays a critical role in understanding the entire paper. It summarizes the body and leaves the final impression. Besides, it may push the readers on further investigation of the issue.

• To make your argumentative essay conclusion powerful, it is not enough just to summarize the arguments. It has to synthesize your ideas and show the connection between them. In other words, your points should be summarized and analyzed.
• Moreover, a conclusion refers to the thesis statement . A mere restatement of the central idea is not the most successful way of finishing your paper. You should try to develop it to demonstrate the reason you’ve written the previous paragraphs.

One more tip:

• Give the audience an incentive to explore the topic more in-depth. Insert the questions for further investigation at the end of your essay. It would play a significant role in making an impressive conclusion.

To sum up, studying abroad is beneficial as it helps a person evolve and perceive a world from new perspectives. It is an opportunity for a participant to explore the world, meet new people, gain valuable knowledge and experience, and broaden their horizons. Education abroad might pose problems like homesickness, loneliness, and trouble with getting accustomed to a new environment. However, all of them can be easily overcome if a student is flexible and eager to become autonomous and independent.

The list of references is a crucial part of any argumentative essay. It should contain all the sources the writer uses in the paper.

Before organizing your reference list , double-check your argumentative essay format. Is it written in MLA, APA, or maybe in Chicago style? How many references does the professor expect you to include? What kind of sources are you required to use?

After figuring out these issues, move to the format requirements of the writing style you use for your paper. The most popular ones are APA (7th edition), MLA, and ChicagoAD (author-date) styles. Below, you can find the examples of a reference for the same book in different formatting styles.

Did you develop a good outline? Congratulations! You are almost done with the essay. Now, you need to fill in the blanks and create a final version of your paper. Here is where you need to demonstrate a high level of your writing skills.

• Make sure your paper has no logical fallacies. Information from an untrustworthy source, a hasty generalization, or a false conclusion may put your reliability as an author under threat. So double-check all the data you include in your essay. Moreover, make sure all your statements are well-developed and supported by valid evidence.
• Check your argumentative essay structure . All the arguments should refer to the thesis statement and must be presented in the logical sequence. The supporting evidence and examples have to be inserted in the text logically, according to the arguments.
• Pay enough attention to the citations. References and in-text citations are incredibly tricky. Always check every detail according to your essay format. If you are unsure of specific issues, refer to a citation guide and make your paper free of formatting mistakes.
• Ensure the coherence of your argumentative essay. Often, the paper’s material seems raw only because it is presented without a logical connection. To ensure a smooth connection between the ideas, use transitions between the paragraphs and linking words inside them. Insert them in the text to connect the points. As a result, you will have a coherent essay with the logical flow of the arguments.

The final step of your writing process is editing and proofreading. Although it is not that energy and time consuming, it still plays a critical role in the work’s success.

While writing your argumentative paper, plan your time accordingly. This will provide you with an opportunity to polish your essay before submitting it. And take a look at our checklist and always use it to improve your papers:

• NO first and second person. Use only the third person in your argumentative essay. It is a general requirement for any kind of academic paper.
• NO slang. The word choice is an essential part of the essay writing process. Ensure you use only formal vocabulary and avoid using informal language (jargon, slang, etc.).
• NO unchecked words. Sometimes, words can raise questions and lead to misunderstandings. If you are unsure whether the term is used appropriately, double-check its meaning or replace it with another.
• NO plagiarism. While proofreading, make sure your citations are either properly paraphrased or taken in quotation marks. You can change the sentence structure to avoid plagiarism.
• NO minor mistakes. Grammar, spelling, punctuation play a crucial role. Want to make your paper look professional? Make sure it is free of minor mistakes then.

Argumentative Essay Topics

• Should student-athletes benefit from sports?  
• Do celebrities really have influence on people behavior?  
• Will decriminalization of drugs increase drug menace?  
• Does social and environmental reporting promote organizations’ financial success? 
• Should online learning be promoted?  
• Can space exploration resolve human problems?  
• Is success really the outcome of hard work? 
• Is there discrimination against women in sports?   
• Will banning tobacco sales promote public health?  
• Is euthanasia a clemency?  
• Should college education be free and accessible for every student?  
• Should football be banned for being too dangerous?  
• Is it time to change social norms?  
• Should public servants’ strikes be prohibited?  
• Does media create a negative image of ageing and older people?  
• Is capitalism the best economic system?  
• Can children under 18 make an appropriate decision on getting tattoo ?  
• Should net neutrality be protected?  
• Can an improper use of social media provoke a family crisis?  
• Is it right to use animals in biomedical research ?  
• Does the climate change affect our indoor environment? 
• Are children’s crimes a result of poor parenting?  
• Should health care be universal? 
• Does the increased use of technology hurt students’ efficiency? 
• Is transformative education a key to the system modernization?  
• Why should patients have access to truthful information?  
• How does language barrier affect health care access?  
• Would allowing adoption by same-sex couples benefit the country’s child welfare system? 
• Is spanking children a proper way to improve their behavior?  
• Does gun control law lowers crime rates?  
• Will ban on spamming improve users’ internet experience?  
• Should behavior be made illegal because it’s immoral?  
• Is globalization really a progress?  
• Does aid to developing countries bring more harm than good?  
• Can parents improve children mental health by restricting internet use ?  
• Is trusting our senses the best way to get the truth?  
• Why parents should not have the right to choose their children based on genetics.  
• Is college education really worth it? 
• Will wearing a body camera by police officer enhance public trust?    
• Immigration : a benefit or a threat?  
• Is it a duty of adult children to take care of their elderly parents?  
• Should abortions be legal? 
• Are agents an integral part of professional sports?  
• Will ban of cellphones while driving decrease the car accident rates? 
• Should marijuana be legal for medical use?  
• Is veganism diet universally beneficial?  
• Should museums return artefacts?  
• Is water birth beneficial for women’s health?  
• Will paying people to stay healthy benefit the nation in the long-term perspective?  
• Is obesity a disease or a choice?  

It is up to you to decide how many parts to include in your essay. However, the 5 paragraph structure is the most appropriate model for an argumentative paper. So, write an introduction, a conclusion, and three body paragraphs.

The pronoun “you” is acceptable for informal writing. Yet, in academic papers, avoid using the second person. The same situation is with the first person. Generally, academic papers require the use of the third person.

A hook aims to grab the readers’ attention. Thus, you could start your essay with an interesting fact about your issue. Another way to create a catchy hook is to prove the audience the relatability of your topic. Make the readers want to explore your essay by demonstrating the significance of your issue.

Yes, you can. A question might become a compelling hook. Just make sure that it is profound, thought-provocative, and concise. A too broad or complicated question will only confuse your readers.

A title is an essential part of the essay since it causes the first impression. While selecting a heading, take into consideration the following points:

1. The title must be catchy.

2. It has to be not too long (5-12 words).

3. The title has to reflect the topic of the paper.

4. It should not be too complicated: the simpler – the better.

Thank you for visiting our page! We hope the information was helpful and insightful. Do you have friends who seek help with writing an argumentative essay? Share our article with them. And don’t forget to leave your comments!

• Sample Argument Essays: Mesa Community College
• Argument: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• Tips on How to Write an Argumentative Essay: Grace Fleming, ThoughtCo
• Tips for Organizing an Argumentative Essay: Judith L., Beumer Writing Center, Valparaiso University
• Argumentative Essay: Oya Ozagac, Bogazici University, Online Writing Lab
• Argumentative Essays: Purdue Online Writing Lab, College of Liberal Arts, Purdue University
• How to Write an Argumentative Essay Step by Step: Virginia Kearney, Owlcation
• Counterargument: Gordon Harvey for the Writing Center at Harvard University
• Basic Steps in the Research Process: North Hennepin Community College, Minnesota
• How to Recognize Plagiarism, Overview: School of Education, Indiana University Bloomington
• 15 Steps to Good Research: Georgetown University Library
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What Are the Five Parts of an Argumentative Essay?

A Well-Structured Thesis

Supporting body paragraphs, your persuasive conclusion.

A five-paragraph or a five-paragraph or a five-part argumentative essay teaches students how to present their claims clearly and confidently, while backing their views with solid evidence from literary texts and credible research materials. The five parts include ​ a strong introductory paragraph with a clear thesis, three body paragraphs substantiated with detailed evidence, and a compelling conclusion. ​ Students should also use transitional words and phrases to guide readers through their arguments.

Essay writing can be challenge as it is, and the added job of persuading your reader to understand, and even agree with, your point of view can make the task all the more intimidating. Let this article act as a roadmap for how you can write a successful five-part argumentative paper.

​ Write an introductory paragraph that introduces your argument and explains why readers should be interested in your topic. ​ A five-part argumentative essay is relatively short, so you must get to the point quickly and gain your readers' interest right from the start. ​ Include a concise, well-constructed thesis statement in your introductory paragraph that explains what you'll be arguing. ​ A thesis statement is often the last sentence in an introduction. If you're arguing about a literary work, include the title and author in your introduction. When arguing a theory or an issue, incorporate background information and explain its relevance. This first part of your essay lays the groundwork for the rest of the essay; if you have a solid introduction, the rest of your writing process will go much smoother.

​ Develop ​ ​ three distinct, yet unified, body paragraphs ​ ​ to support the claims in your thesis. ​ For example, if you're arguing that standardized tests don't accurately represent a student's academic strengths or problem-solving capabilities, one body paragraph might discuss the shortcomings of ACT and SAT tests, another might explain why some academic skills and abilities aren't represented by standardized tests and a third why some students struggle to perform well on timed tests, despite their knowledge and understanding of the material. Create a topic sentence that clearly explains the objective for each body paragraph. Use specific examples from reliable resources, such as academic journals, peer reviews and professional commentaries, to back your views.

​ Remember: ​ with every piece of evidence in an essay comes the responsibility of giving credit where credit is due; at the end of your argumentative essay, you will have a list of references in which you will cite the sources that gave you all of your information. In the actual body of the essay, you can cite your sources at the end of a sentence with in-text citations.

You also need to ​ address counterarguments ​ in the body of your essay -- always treating opposing viewpoints with courtesy and respect -- and explain how those counterclaims don't hold up. Showing that you understand and acknowledge opposing arguments increases your own credibility and makes your rebuttal much stronger; a good argumentative essay uses lots of critical thinking and shows that you have considered the main points of both arguments before coming to your own conclusions.

​ Create a compelling conclusion that brings your argument to a close. ​ ​ Don't introduce new information in your conclusion. ​ Explain how your evidence clearly supports your arguments and why your thesis is well-founded, logical and credible. The conclusion will leave readers with a lasting impression of your essay. Challenge readers to consider your viewpoints, using passionate, persuasive language to make your closing remarks.

Transitional Phrases

Incorporate transitional words and phrases throughout your paper to unify your five paragraphs. Otherwise, your paper will seem short, abrupt and choppy. Opt for transitional words and phrases, such as ​ "similarly," "on the same note," "in agreement with," "contrarily," "in support of," "to back the argument," "equally important," "nevertheless," "with this in mind," "provided that," "for example," "all things considered" and "given these points" ​ to add continuity, flow and readability to your argumentative essay.

Argumentative writing requires you to address opposing points of view and give concise reasons as to why your argument is the strongest. In a persuasive essay, the type of language you use as well as the reliability of your sources will impact the likelihood that your reader will be swayed by your arguments. Once you have mastered this essay format, you will become much better at developing clear and impactful arguments.

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How to write an essay with a thesis statement.

• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill -- The Writing Center: Argument
• DePaul University: Type of Writing -- Writing an Argumentative Essay

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9.2: Introduction to Argumentative Essays

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What you’ll learn to do: evaluate argumentative essays and thesis statements

An academic argument asserts a claim and supports that claim with evidence.

The goal of an argument is to convince readers that the writer’s position is reasonable, valid, and worthy of consideration. Therefore, an argumentative thesis statement needs to be not only clear and focused, but also debatable, assertive, and reasoned. Additionally, an argumentative thesis must be able to be supported with evidence.

In this section, you’ll learn about argumentative essays and how they are shaped around strong, clear thesis statements.

Contributors and Attributions

• Outcome: Argumentative Thesis Statements. Provided by : University of Mississippi. License : CC BY: Attribution
• Graphic of a discussion. Authored by : Tumisu. Provided by : Pixabay. Located at : pixabay.com/illustrations/interview-job-icon-job-interview-1018333/. License : Other . License Terms : pixabay.com/service/terms/#license

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USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 1 of 70 IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT TIKTOK INC., and BYTEDANCE LTD., V. ) Petitioners, No. 24-1113 MERRICK B. GARLAND, in his official capacity as Attorney General of the United States, (Page 1 of Total) Respondent. PETITION FOR REVIEW OF CONSTITUTIONALITY OF THE PROTECTING AMERICANS FROM FOREIGN ADVERSARY CONTROLLED APPLICATIONS ACT

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 2 of 70 2. That law 1. Congress has taken the unprecedented step of expressly singling out and banning TikTok: a vibrant online forum for protected speech and expression used by 170 million Americans to create, share, and view videos over the Internet. For the first time in history, Congress has enacted a law that subjects a single, named speech platform to a permanent, nationwide ban, and bars every American from participating in a unique online community with more than 1 billion people worldwide. the Protecting Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act (the "Act") is unconstitutional. Banning Tik Tok is so obviously unconstitutional, in fact, that even the Act's sponsors recognized that reality, and therefore have tried mightily to depict the law not as a ban at all, but merely a regulation of TikTok's ownership. According to its sponsors, the Act responds to TikTok's ultimate ownership by ByteDance Ltd., a company with Chinese subsidiaries whose employees support various Byte Dance businesses, including TikTok. They claim that the Act is not a ban because it offers Byte Dance a choice: divest TikTok's U.S. business or be shut down.1 ― - 1 References to "TikTok Inc." are to the specific U.S. corporate entity that is a Petitioner in this lawsuit and publishes the TikTok platform in the 1 (Page 2 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 3 of 70 3. But in reality, there is no choice. The "qualified divestiture" demanded by the Act to allow TikTok to continue operating in the United States is simply not possible: not commercially, not technologically, not legally. And certainly not on the 270-day timeline required by the Act. Petitioners have repeatedly explained this to the U.S. government, and sponsors of the Act were aware that divestment is not possible. There is no question: the Act will force a shutdown of TikTok by January 19, 2025, silencing the 170 million Americans who use the platform to communicate in ways that cannot be replicated elsewhere. 4. Of course, even if a "qualified divestiture" were feasible, the Act would still be an extraordinary and unconstitutional assertion of power. If upheld, it would allow the government to decide that a company may no longer own and publish the innovative and unique speech United States. References to "TikTok" are to the online platform, which includes both the Tik Tok mobile application and web browser experience. References to “ByteDance Ltd." are to the specific Cayman Islands- incorporated holding company that is identified in the Act and is a Petitioner in this lawsuit. References to "ByteDance" are to the ByteDance group, inclusive of ByteDance Ltd. and relevant operating subsidiaries. TikTok Inc. and ByteDance. Ltd. are together referred to as "Petitioners." (Page 3 of Total) 21

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 4 of 70 platform it created. If Congress can do this, it can circumvent the First. Amendment by invoking national security and ordering the publisher of any individual newspaper or website to sell to avoid being shut down. And for Tik Tok, any such divestiture would disconnect Americans from the rest of the global community on a platform devoted to shared content an outcome fundamentally at odds with the Constitution's commitment to both free speech and individual liberty. 5. There are good reasons why Congress has never before enacted a law like this. Consistent with the First Amendment's guarantee of freedom of expression, the United States has long championed a free and open Internet - and the Supreme Court has repeatedly recognized that speech "conveyed over the Internet” fully qualifies for “the First Amendment's protections." 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, 600 U.S. 570, 587 (2023). And consistent with the fundamental principles of fairness and equal treatment rooted in the Bill of Attainder Clause and the Fifth Amendment, Congress has never before crafted a two-tiered speech regime with one set of rules for one named platform, and another set of rules for everyone else. (Page 4 of Total) 3

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 5 of 70 6. In dramatic contrast with past enactments that sought to regulate constitutionally protected activity, Congress enacted these extreme measures without a single legislative finding. The Act does not articulate any threat posed by Tik Tok nor explain why TikTok should be excluded from evaluation under the standards Congress concurrently imposed on every other platform. Even the statements by individual Members of Congress and a congressional committee report merely indicate concern about the hypothetical possibility that TikTok could be misused in the future, without citing specific evidence - even though the platform has operated prominently in the United States since it was first launched in 2017. Those speculative concerns fall far short of what is required when First Amendment rights are at stake. 7. Nor is there any indication that Congress considered any number of less restrictive alternatives, such as those that Petitioners developed with the Executive Branch after government agencies began evaluating the security of U.S. user data and the risk of foreign government influence over the platform's content as far back as 2019. While such concerns were never substantiated, Petitioners nevertheless (Page 5 of Total) 4

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 6 of 70 worked with the government for four years on a voluntary basis to develop a framework to address the government's concerns. 8. As part of this engagement, Petitioners have voluntarily invested more than $2 billion to build a system of technological and governance protections sometimes referred to as "Project Texas" - to help safeguard U.S. user data and the integrity of the U.S. TikTok platform against foreign government influence. Petitioners have also made extraordinary, additional commitments in a 90-page draft National Security Agreement developed through negotiations with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States ("CFIUS”), including agreeing to a “shut-down option” that would give the government the authority to suspend TikTok in the United States if Petitioners violate certain obligations under the agreement. 9. Congress tossed this tailored agreement aside, in favor of the politically expedient and punitive approach of targeting for disfavor one publisher and speaker (TikTok Inc.), one speech forum (TikTok), and that forum's ultimate owner (ByteDance Ltd.). Through the Act's two-tiered. structure, Congress consciously eschewed responsible industry-wide. regulation and betrayed its punitive and discriminatory purpose. 5 (Page 6 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 7 of 70 Congress provided every other company however serious a threat to - national security it might pose - paths to avoiding a ban, excluding only Tik Tok Inc. and ByteDance Ltd. Indeed, for any other company's application to be banned, Congress mandated notice and a "public report" describing "the specific national security" concern, accompanied by supporting classified evidence. For Petitioners only, however, there is no statement of reasons and no supporting evidence, with any discussion of the justifications for a ban occurring only behind closed doors. 10. Congress must abide by the dictates of the Constitution even when it claims to be protecting against national security risks: “against [those] dangers ... as against others, the principle of the right to free speech is always the same." Abrams v. United States, 250 U.S. 616, 628 (1919) (Holmes, J., dissenting). Congress failed to do so here, and the Act should be enjoined. 11. Jurisdictional Statement Pursuant to Sections 3(a) and 3(b) of the Act, H.R. 815, div. H, 118th Cong., Pub. L. No. 118-50 (April 24, 2024), this Court has original (Page 7 of Total) 6

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 8 of 70 and exclusive jurisdiction over this challenge to the constitutionality of the Act. 2 A. 12. Background and Nature of Proceedings TikTok Is a Speech Platform Used by 170 Million Americans. Tik Tok is an online video entertainment platform designed to provide a creative and entertaining forum for users to express themselves and make connections with others over the Internet. More than 170 million Americans use TikTok every month, to learn about and share information on a range of topics from entertainment, to religion, to - politics. Content creators use the TikTok platform to express their opinions, discuss their political views, support their preferred political candidates, and speak out on today's many pressing issues, all to a global audience of more than 1 billion users. Many creators also use the 2 A copy of the Act is attached to this Petition as Exhibit A. Because this Petition does not involve a challenge to any agency action, it is not governed by Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 15(a). Petitioners intend to file a separate motion regarding the procedures governing this original proceeding. Petitioners summarize the pertinent facts and claims below to facilitate this Court's review consistent with the practice of a case-initiating pleading in a court of original jurisdiction, but reserve their rights to present additional facts and arguments in due course. 7 (Page 8 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 9 of 70 platform to post product reviews, business reviews, and travel information and reviews. 13. In the United States, the TikTok platform is provided by Tik Tok Inc., a California-incorporated company that has its principal place of business in Culver City, California and offices in New York, San Jose, Chicago, and Miami, among other locations. TikTok Inc. has thousands of employees in the United States. Like many platforms owned by companies that operate globally, the global TikTok platform is supported not only by those employees, but also by employees of other ByteDance subsidiaries around the globe, including in Singapore, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Germany, South Africa, Australia, and China. Many of the global TikTok platform's functions are spread across different corporate entities and countries, and the global TikTok business is led by a leadership team based in Singapore and the United States. Like other U.S. companies, TikTok Inc. is governed by U.S. law. 14. Tik Tok Inc.'s ultimate parent company is ByteDance Ltd., a Cayman Islands-incorporated equity holding company. Byte Dance was founded in 2012 by Chinese entrepreneurs. Over time, the company sought funding to fuel growth, as is common in the technology sector, 8 (Page 9 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 10 of 70 which resulted in the issuance of additional equity and the dilution of existing shares. Today, approximately 58 percent of ByteDance Ltd. is owned by global institutional investors (such as BlackRock, General Atlantic, and Susquehanna International Group), 21 percent is owned by the company's founder (a Chinese national who lives in Singapore), and 21 percent is owned by employees including approximately 7,000 Americans. 15. ByteDance launched TikTok in May 2017 in over 150 countries, including the United States.³ Since its launch, TikTok has become one of the world's most popular applications, with over 1 billion users worldwide. As of January 2024, more than 170 million Americans use TikTok on a monthly basis. 16. Users primarily view content on TikTok through its "For You" page, which presents a collection of videos curated by TikTok's proprietary recommendation engine. The recommendation engine customizes each user's content feed based on how the user interacts with 3 Tik Tok was later relaunched in August 2018 following a transaction involving the company Musical.ly. See generally Petition for Review, Tik Tok Inc. v. CFIUS, No. 20-1444 (D.C. Cir. Nov. 10, 2020). 9 (Page 10 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 11 of 70 the content that the user watches. TikTok's popularity is based in large part on the effectiveness of the recommendation engine. The source code for TikTok's recommendation engine was originally developed by ByteDance engineers based in China, and the engine is customized for operations in TikTok's various global markets, including in the United States. TikTok is not offered in mainland China. 17. Aside from TikTok, ByteDance has developed and operates more than a dozen other online platforms and software applications for use in U.S. and international markets, including for content-sharing, video and music editing, e-commerce, gaming, and enterprise productivity. B. 18. The Government Previously Made Unlawful Attempts to Ban TikTok. Petitioners' efforts to address the U.S. government's asserted concerns regarding the TikTok platform date back to 2019. At that time, Petitioners began engaging with CFIUS, which had initiated a review of ByteDance Ltd.'s 2017 acquisition of Musical.ly, another Internet-based video-sharing platform. (Page 11 of Total) 10

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 12 of 70 19. Petitioners were in the early stages of engaging with CFIUS on a voluntary basis to address the government's concerns, when on August 6, 2020, President Trump abruptly issued an executive order purporting to ban TikTok under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act ("IEEPA”), 50 U.S.C. §§ 1701-08. See 85 Fed. Reg. 48,637 (the "Ban Order"). Two separate district courts preliminarily enjoined the Ban Order, concluding (among other things) that it exceeded the President's IEEPA authority. TikTok Inc. v. Trump, 490 F. Supp. 3d 73, 83 (D.D.C. 2020); TikTok Inc. v. Trump, 507 F. Supp. 3d 92, 112 (D.D.C. 2020); Marland v. Trump, 498 F. Supp. 3d 624, 641 (E.D. Pa. 2020). 20. Specifically, as these courts correctly recognized, the President's IEEPA authority "to deal with any unusual and extraordinary threat" to the nation “does not include the authority to regulate or prohibit, directly or indirectly ... [any] personal communication” or the importation or exportation “of any information or informational materials.” 50 U.S.C. § 1702(b)(1), (3). These restrictions on the President's IEEPA authority-which Congress expanded through multiple amendments to the statute were designed “to prevent the statute from running afoul of the First Amendment.” United States v. 11 (Page 12 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 13 of 70 Amirnazmi, 645 F.3d 564, 585 (3d Cir. 2011) (quotation marks omitted); see also Kalantari v. NITV, Inc., 352 F.3d 1202, 1205 (9th Cir. 2003) (IEEPA's limitations necessary “to prevent the executive branch from restricting the international flow of materials protected by the First. Amendment"); Marland, 498 F. Supp. 3d at 629 (same). 21. Looking to the foundational First Amendment principles codified in IEEPA's text and legislative history, these courts concluded that President Trump's efforts to ban TikTok violated the statute and raised "serious" constitutional questions (which were unnecessary to decide under the doctrine of constitutional avoidance). Tik Tok Inc., 507 F. Supp. 3d at 112 n.6; TikTok Inc., 490 F. Supp. 3d at 83 n.3. The courts granted the government's motions to voluntarily dismiss its appeals after President Biden withdrew the Ban Order. See Tik Tok Inc. v. Biden, No. 20-5302, 2021 WL 3713550 (D.C. Cir. July 20, 2021); Tik Tok Inc. v. Biden, No. 20-5381, 2021 WL 3082803 (D.C. Cir. July 14, 2021); Marland v. Trump, No. 20-3322, 2021 WL 5346749 (3d Cir. July 14, 2021). 22. Separately, acting on a CFIUS referral, President Trump on August 14, 2020 issued an order under Section 721 of the Defense Production Act, 50 U.S.C. § 4565, purporting to direct ByteDance to 12 (Page 13 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 14 of 70 divest from TikTok's U.S. business and U.S. user data. 85 Fed. Reg. 51,297 (the "Divestment Order"). On November 10, 2020, Petitioners petitioned this Court for review of the Divestment Order and underlying CFIUS actions, arguing, among other things, that the government lacked jurisdiction under the statute. See Petition for Review, TikTok Inc. v. CFIUS, No. 20-1444 (D.C. Cir. Nov. 10, 2020). That petition was held in abeyance in February 2021 on the parties' joint motion to allow the parties to negotiate a resolution. The government has filed status reports every 60 days since then, most recently on April 22, 2024. Those status reports have consistently reported that “[t]he parties continue to be involved in ongoing negotiations” and “[a] beyance continues to be appropriate.” See, e.g., Status Report, Tik Tok Inc. v. CFIUS, No. 20-1444 (D.C. Cir. Apr. 22, 2024). 23. Between January 2021 and August 2022, Petitioners and CFIUS engaged in an intensive, fact-based process to develop a National Security Agreement that would resolve the U.S. government's concerns about whether Chinese authorities might be able to access U.S. user data or manipulate content on TikTok, as well as resolve the pending CFIUS During that time, Petitioners and government officials dispute. 13 (Page 14 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 15 of 70 communicated regularly, often several times a week - including several - in-person meetings about the government's concerns and potential solutions. The result was an approximately 90-page draft National Security Agreement with detailed annexes embodying a comprehensive solution addressing the government's national security concerns. Notably, the draft National Security Agreement provided that all protected U.S. user data (as defined in the agreement) would be stored in the cloud environment of a U.S.-government-approved partner, Oracle Corporation, which would also review and vet the TikTok source code. 24. From Petitioners' perspective, all indications were that they were nearing a final agreement. After August 2022, however, CFIUS without explanation stopped engaging with Petitioners in meaningful discussions about the National Security Agreement. Petitioners repeatedly asked why discussions had ended and how they might be restarted, but they did not receive a substantive response. In March 2023, without providing any justification for why the draft National Security Agreement was inadequate, CFIUS insisted that Byte Dance would be required to divest the U.S. TikTok business. (Page 15 of Total) 14

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 16 of 70 25. Since March 2023, Petitioners have explained to CFIUS, in multiple written communications and in-person meetings, that a divestiture of the U.S. TikTok business from the rest of the integrated global Tik Tok platform and business of the sort now required by the Act is not feasible. CFIUS has never articulated any basis for disagreeing with that assessment, offering instead only a conclusory assertion that the reason ByteDance was not divesting was because it was simply unwilling to do so. The Act nonetheless incorporates precisely such an infeasible divestiture standard. C. 26. A Divestiture that Severs TikTok's U.S. Operations From the Rest of the Globally Integrated TikTok Business Is Not Commercially, Technologically, or Legally Feasible. The Act purports to allow Petitioners to avoid a ban by executing a "qualified divestiture." Sec. 2(c). But that alternative is illusory because, as Petitioners have repeatedly explained to CFIUS, the divestiture of the TikTok U.S. business and its severance from the globally integrated platform of which it is an integral part is not commercially, technologically, or legally feasible. (Page 16 of Total) 15

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 17 of 70 - 27. First, a standalone U.S. TikTok platform would not be commercially viable. TikTok and its competitors are globally integrated platforms where content created in one country is available to users in other countries. Indeed, a substantial part of TikTok's appeal is the richness of the international content available on the platform from global sporting events like the Olympics to international K-pop stars from South Korea, as well as videos created by U.S. creators and enjoyed by audiences worldwide. A divestment of the U.S. TikTok platform, without any operational relationship with the remainder of the global platform, would preclude the interoperability necessary to make international content seamlessly available in the U.S. market and vice versa. As a result, the U.S. TikTok platform would become an “island” where Americans would have an experience detached from the rest of the global platform and its over 1 billion users. Such a limited pool of content, in turn, would dramatically undermine the value and viability of the U.S. TikTok business.4 4 The contemplated qualified divestiture would also undercut the important role currently played by American voices in the global conversation ongoing on TikTok. 16 (Page 17 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 18 of 70 28. Second, precipitously moving all TikTok source code development from ByteDance to a new Tik Tok owner would be impossible as a technological matter. The platform consists of millions of lines of software code that have been painstakingly developed by thousands of engineers over multiple years. Although much of this code is basic infrastructure for running the global TikTok platform and has nothing at all to do with TikTok's recommendation algorithm, the statute requires that all of this code be wrested from Petitioners, so that there is no “operational relationship" between ByteDance and the new U.S. platform. Specifically, to comply with the law's divestiture requirement, that code base would have to be moved to a large, alternative team of engineers a team that does not exist and would have no understanding of the complex code necessary to run the platform. It would take years for an entirely new set of engineers to gain sufficient familiarity with the source code to perform the ongoing, necessary maintenance and development activities for the platform. Moreover, to keep the platform functioning, these engineers would need access to ByteDance software tools, which the Act prohibits. Such a fundamental rearchitecting is not - (Page 18 of Total) 17

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 19 of 70 remotely feasible on anything approaching the 270-day timeframe contemplated by the Act. 29. Third, the Chinese government has made clear that it would not permit a divestment of the recommendation engine that is a key to the success of TikTok in the United States. Like the United States,5 China regulates the export of certain technologies originating there. China's export control rules cover “information processing technologies” such as "personal interactive data algorithms.”6 China's official news agency has reported that under these rules, any sale of recommendation algorithms developed by engineers employed by ByteDance subsidiaries in China, including for TikTok, would require a government license. 5 For example, the U.S. Department of Commerce has issued restrictions on the export to China of advanced chips that can be used to train artificial intelligence models. E.g., Implementation of Additional Export Controls: Certain Advanced Computing Items; Supercomputer and Semiconductor End Use; Updates and Corrections, 88 Fed. Reg. 73458 (Oct. 25, 2023) (to be codified at 15 C.F.R. § 732.2 et seq.). 6 See Karen M. Sutter, Cong. Rsch. Serv., IN11524, China Issues New Export Control Law and Related Policies 2 (2020). 7 Paul Mozur, Raymond Zhong & David McCabe, Tik Tok Deal Is Complicated by New Rules From China Over Tech Exports, N.Y. Times (Aug. 29, 2020), https://perma.cc/L6RB-CTT9. 18 (Page 19 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 20 of 70 China also enacted an additional export control law that "gives the Chinese government new policy tools and justifications to deny and impose terms on foreign commercial transactions."8 China adopted these enhanced export control restrictions between August and October 2020, shortly after President Trump's August 6, 2020 and August 14, 2020 executive orders targeting TikTok. By doing so, the Chinese government clearly signaled that it would assert its export control powers with respect to any attempt to sever TikTok's operations from ByteDance, and that any severance would leave TikTok without access to the recommendation engine that has created a unique style and community that cannot be replicated on any other platform today. D. 30. The Act Bans TikTok and Other Byte Dance Applications. On April 24, 2024, the President signed the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act. 31. The Act prohibits, on pain of draconian penalties, “online mobile application store[s]" and "internet hosting services" from servicing "foreign adversary controlled application[s]" within the United States. 8 Sutter, supra n.6. 19 (Page 20 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 21 of 70 See Sec. 2(a), 2(d)(1)(A). This includes the "distribution, maintenance, or updating" of a covered application through an online marketplace. Sec. 2(a)(1). 32. Section 2(g) (3) creates two classes of "foreign adversary controlled applications" covered by the Act. 33. The first class singles out only one corporate group: "Byte Dance[] Ltd.,” “TikTok,” their “subsidiar[ies] or successor[s]" that are "controlled by a foreign adversary," or any entity "owned or controlled" by the aforementioned.9 The Act deems any application. operated by these entities a “foreign adversary controlled application," without any finding about why any particular application much less - - every application operated by these entities should be so designated. See Sec. 2(g)(3)(A). 9 “TikTok” is a platform, not a legal entity. Petitioners assume that Congress intended this provision to be a reference to TikTok Inc., and further reserve their rights to amend this Petition to include additional Tik Tok entities to the extent the government takes the position that other entities are covered by this reference. In any event, TikTok Inc. is covered as an entity “owned or controlled" by ByteDance Ltd. 20 (Page 21 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 22 of 70 34. The second class creates a discretionary process by which the President can designate other companies whose applications will also effectively be banned. Under these provisions, the President may designate an application as a "foreign adversary controlled application" if several qualifications are met: a. Covered Company. The website or application is operated directly or indirectly by a "covered company" - i.e., a company that operates a website or application that permits users to share content and has at least 1 million monthly active users. See Sec. 2(g)(2)(A). b. Controlled by a Foreign Adversary. The "covered company" operating the website or application must also be "controlled by a foreign adversary," meaning it is "headquartered in, has its principal place of business in, or is organized under the laws" of a "foreign adversary country," which currently includes China, North Korea, Russia, and Iran. Sec. 2(g)(1)(A), (g)(4); see also 10 U.S.C. § 4872(d)(2). A company may also be "controlled by a foreign adversary" if persons domiciled in any of the 21 (Page 22 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 23 of 70 (Page 23 of Total) specified countries (i.e., China, Iran, Russia, or North Korea) directly or indirectly own at least 20 percent of the company. Sec. 2(g)(1)(B). c. Not Exempt under Sec. 2(g)(2)(B). But Congress specifically exempted from the term “covered company" any "entity that operates" a website or application "whose primary purpose is to allow users to post product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews." An entity that operates a single website or application of this nature thus cannot be a “covered company,” even if it is "controlled by a foreign adversary," poses a significant national security risk, and separately operates an application whose primary purpose is anything other than allowing users to post reviews. Sec. 2(g)(2)(B). d. Presidential Determination, Notice and Report, and Judicial Review. Finally, the President must determine that such a company presents “a significant threat to the national security of the United States." Sec. 2(g)(3)(B)(ii). Before making such a determination, the President must 22

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 24 of 70 issue public notice proposing the determination and then provide a public report to Congress describing "the specific national security concern involved," supplemented by a classified annex, and also explain "what assets would need to be divested to execute a qualified divestiture." Id. These presidential determinations are then subject to judicial review. Sec. 3(a). 35. Section 2(c) exempts a "foreign adversary controlled application[]" from the Act's prohibitions if the company that operates the application executes a “qualified divestiture." Sec. 2(c). The President must determine that such divestiture would (1) "result in the relevant covered company no longer being controlled by a foreign adversary," and (2) “preclude[] the establishment or maintenance of any operational relationship" between the application's U.S. operations and any formerly affiliated entities that are controlled by a foreign adversary, including "any cooperation with respect to the operation of a content. recommendation algorithm." Sec. 2(c), (g) (6). As noted above, the Act's broad definition of "controlled by a foreign adversary" includes, among other things, any entity organized under the laws of a "foreign adversary 23 (Page 24 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 25 of 70 country," or any entity in which a foreign person domiciled in a foreign adversary country holds at least a 20 percent ownership stake. Sec. 2(g)(1), (3)(B)(i), (4). 36. The prohibition on providing Internet hosting and mobile application store services to TikTok and other ByteDance applications. takes effect 270 days after enactment. Sec. 2(a)(2)(A). The President may extend this deadline, but only for 90 days maximum, and only if the President certifies to Congress that a path to executing a qualified divestiture has been identified, evidence of significant progress toward executing that qualified divestiture has been produced, and the relevant binding legal agreements to enable execution of the qualified divestiture are in place. 37. "Before the date on which [this] prohibition" takes effect, Petitioners are required to provide, upon request by any U.S. user of any of their applications, “all the available data related to the account of such user with respect to such application." Sec. 2(b).10 10 Because Section 2(b)'s data portability requirement applies "[b]efore" the prohibition under Section 2(a) takes effect, it cannot be "given effect" without Section 2(a) for purposes of Section 2(e)(1) of the Act, which provides that "[i]f any provision of this section or the application of this 24 (Page 25 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 26 of 70 38. Because the Act lacks any legislative findings or a statement of purpose, Petitioners and the more than 170 million American monthly users of TikTok are left to scrutinize statements from individual Members of Congress and other sources to try to discern any purported justification for this extraordinary intrusion on free speech rights. Based on these sources, it appears at least some Members of Congress sought to address "two threats" that could emerge from foreign ownership of communications platforms. 11 39. First, they may have sought to protect U.S. users' “data security."12 According to the House Committee Report for an earlier version of the Act, mobile applications, including those that are not section to any person or circumstance is held invalid, the invalidity shall not affect the other provisions or applications of this section that can be given effect without the invalid provision or application." Because Section 2(a) violates the Constitution for the reasons set forth herein, Section 2(b) is accordingly "not operative in the absence of the unconstitutional provision.” Barr v. Am. Ass'n of Pol. Consultants, Inc., 140 S. Ct. 2335, 2352 n.9 (2020). 11 Jane Coaston, What the Tik Tok Bill Is Really About, According to a Leading Republican, N.Y. Times (Apr. 1, 2024), https://perma.cc/BL32- 786X (quoting the Act's original sponsor, Rep. Mike Gallagher). 12 Id. (Page 26 of Total) 25

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 27 of 70 controlled by foreign adversaries, can “collect vast amounts of data on Americans."13 The House Committee Report expressed a concern that such data could be used by a foreign adversary to "conduct espionage campaigns," such as by tracking specific individuals. 14 40. Second, others in Congress appear to have been motivated by a "greater concern": an alleged "propaganda threat." 15 One proponent of the Act stated that communications applications could be used to "push misinformation, disinformation, and propaganda on the American public."16 Another supporter claimed in the House Select Committee press release accompanying the bill's introduction that “[TikTok] is ... poisoning the minds of our youth every day on a massive scale."17 13 H.R. Comm. on Energy & Com., Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, H.R. Rep. No. 118-417 at 2 (2024) (hereinafter the "House Committee Report"). 14 Id. 15 Coaston, supra n.11 (quoting Rep. Gallagher). 16 House Committee Report at 2. 17 Press Release, U.S. House Select Comm. on Strategic Competition Between the U.S. and the Chinese Communist Party, Gallagher, Bipartisan Coalition Introduce Legislation to Protect Americans From Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications, Including TikTok (Mar. 5, 2024), https://perma.cc/KC5T-6AX3. (Page 27 of Total) 26

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 28 of 70 E. Congress Disregarded Alternatives to Banning TikTok, Such as the National Security Measures Petitioners Negotiated with the Executive Branch. 41. Petitioners have demonstrated a commitment to addressing both of those concerns without the need to resort to the drastic, unconstitutional step of shuttering one of the most widely used forums for speech in the United States. The 90-page draft National Security Agreement that Petitioners developed with Petitioners developed with CFIUS would, if implemented, provide U.S. TikTok users with protections more robust than those employed by any other widely used online platform in the industry. 42. The draft National Security Agreement contains several means of ensuring data security without banning TikTok. All protected U.S. user data (as defined in the National Security Agreement) would be safeguarded in the United States under a special corporate structure: TikTok U.S. Data Security (a new subsidiary of Tik Tok Inc.). A special board, with Security Directors whose appointment would be subject to the U.S. government's approval, would oversee TikTok U.S. Data Security, and in turn exclude ByteDance and all of its other subsidiaries and affiliates from such responsibilities. Further separation between the 27 (Page 28 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 29 of 70 U.S. TikTok business and Byte Dance subsidiaries and affiliates, including TikTok in the rest of the world, would be achieved by appointing a U.S.-government-approved Security Director to the board of Tik Tok Inc. Protected U.S. user data would be stored in the cloud environment of a U.S.-government-approved partner, Oracle Corporation, with access to such data managed by TikTok U.S. Data Security. 43. The draft Agreement would also protect against the concern about content manipulation and propaganda. Multiple layers of protection address concerns related to content available on the TikTok platform, including ensuring that all content moderation - both human and algorithmic ➖ would be subject to third-party verification and monitoring. The concern about content manipulation would also be addressed by securing all software code through Oracle Corporation, a U.S. trusted technology provider. The Tik Tok U.S. platform and application would be deployed through the Oracle cloud infrastructure and subject to source code review and vetting by Oracle with another U.S.-government-approved third party responsible for conducting security inspections. As part of this process, Oracle and third parties 28 (Page 29 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 30 of 70 approved by CFIUS would conduct independent inspections of the Tik Tok recommendation engine. 44. The draft Agreement also includes strict penalties for noncompliance, including a "shut-down option," giving the government the authority to suspend TikTok in the United States in response to specified acts of noncompliance. The Agreement also provides significant monetary penalties and other remedies for noncompliance. 45. Although the government has apparently abandoned the draft National Security Agreement, Petitioners have not. TikTok Inc. has begun the process of voluntarily implementing the National Security Agreement's provisions to the extent it can do so without the U.S. government's cooperation, including by incorporating and staffing the TikTok U.S. Data Security entity, and by partnering with Oracle Corporation on the migration of the U.S. platform and protected U.S. user data to Oracle's cloud environment. 46. To date, Petitioners have spent more than $2 billion to implement these measures and resolve the very concerns publicly expressed by congressional supporters of the Act all without the overbroad and unconstitutional method of an outright ban. 29 (Page 30 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 31 of 70 Grounds On Which Relief Is Sought Petitioners seek review of the constitutionality of the Act on grounds that include, without limitation, the following. Ground 1: Violation of the First Amendment 47. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides that "Congress shall make no law. . . abridging the freedom of speech." U.S. Const., amend. I. 48. By banning all online platforms and software applications offered by "TikTok" and all ByteDance subsidiaries, Congress has made a law curtailing massive amounts of protected speech. Unlike broadcast television and radio stations, which require government licenses to operate because they use the public airwaves, the government cannot, consistent with the First Amendment, dictate the ownership of newspapers, websites, online platforms, and other privately created. speech forums. 49. Indeed, in the past, Congress has recognized the importance of protecting First Amendment rights, even when regulating in the interest of national security. For example, Congress repeatedly amended IEEPA which grants the President broad authority to address national 30 (Page 31 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 32 of 70 emergencies that pose "unusual and extraordinary threat[s]" to the country to expand protections for constitutionally protected materials. 50 U.S.C. §§ 1701-02. Accordingly, under IEEPA, the President does not have the authority to even indirectly regulate "personal communication" or the importation or exportation "of any information or informational materials,” id. § 1702(b)(1), (3) limitations that are necessary "to prevent the statute from running afoul of the First Amendment," Amirnazmi, 645 F.3d at 585. Yet Congress has attempted to sidestep these statutory protections aimed at protecting Americans' constitutional rights, preferring instead to simply enact a new statute that tries to avoid the constitutional limitations on the government's existing statutory Those statutory protections were evidently seen as an impediment to Congress's goal of banning TikTok, so the Act dispensed authority. with them. 50. The Act's alternative to a ban a so-called “qualified - - divestiture" is illusory to the point of being no alternative at all. As explained above, divesting TikTok Inc.'s U.S. business and completely severing it from the globally integrated platform of which it is a part is not commercially, technologically, or legally feasible. 31 (Page 32 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 33 of 70 51. The Act will therefore have the effect of shutting down TikTok in the United States, a popular forum for free speech and expression used by over 170 million Americans each month. And the Act will do so based not on any proof of a compelling interest, but on speculative and analytically flawed concerns about data security and content manipulation concerns that, even if grounded in fact, could be - addressed through far less restrictive and more narrowly tailored means. 52. Petitioners' protected speech rights. The Act burdens Tik Tok Inc.'s First Amendment rights in addition to the free speech - rights of millions of people throughout the United States in two ways. - 53. First, Petitioner TikTok Inc. has a First Amendment interest in its editorial and publishing activities on TikTok. See Hurley v. Irish- Am. Gay, Lesbian & Bisexual Grp. of Bos., 515 U.S. 557, 570 (1995). TikTok “is more than a passive receptacle or conduit for news, comment, and advertising" of others; TikTok Inc.'s "choice of material" to recommend or forbid “constitute[s] the exercise of editorial control and judgment" that is protected by the First Amendment. Miami Herald Pub. Co. v. Tornillo, 418 U.S. 241, 258 (1974); see also Alario v. Knudsen, (Page 33 of Total) 32

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 34 of 70 - F. Supp. 3d, 2023 WL 8270811, at *6 (D. Mont. Nov. 30, 2023) (recognizing Tik Tok Inc.'s First Amendment editorial rights). 54. As the government itself has acknowledged, “[w]hen [social media] platforms decide which third-party content to present and how to present it, they engage in expressive activity protected by the First Amendment because they are creating expressive compilations of speech." Br. for United States as Amicus Curiae at 12-13, Moody v. NetChoice LLC, No. 22-277 (U.S.), 2023 WL 8600432; see also id. at 18- 19, 25-26. 55. Second, Tik Tok Inc. is among the speakers whose expression the Act prohibits. TikTok Inc. uses the TikTok platform to create and share its own content about issues and current events, including, for example, its support for small businesses, Earth Day, and literacy and education. 18 When TikTok Inc. does so, it is engaging in core speech protected by the First Amendment. See Sorrell v. IMS Health Inc., 564 18 Tik Tok (@tiktok), TikTok, https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTL9QsTYs/ (last visited May 6, 2024); TikTok (@tiktok), TikTok, https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTL9QbSHv/ (last visited May 6, 2024); TikTok (@tiktok), TikTok, https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTL9QXE7R/ (last visited May 6, 2024). (Page 34 of Total) 33

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 35 of 70 U.S. 552, 570 (2011); NetChoice, LLC v. Att'y Gen., Fla., 34 F.4th 1196, 1210 (11th Cir. 2022), cert. granted, 144 S. Ct. 478 (2023). The Act precludes TikTok Inc. from expressing itself over that platform. 56. Even if the U.S. TikTok platform could be divested, which it cannot for the reasons explained above, TikTok Inc.'s protected speech rights would still be burdened. Because the Act appears to conclusively determine that any application operated by "TikTok" - a term that — Congress presumably meant to include Tik Tok Inc. is a foreign adversary controlled application, Sec. 2(g)(3)(A), the President appears to lack the power to determine that a TikTok Inc.-owned application is "no longer being controlled by a foreign adversary" and has no “operational relationship" with “formerly affiliated entities that are controlled by a foreign adversary," Sec. 2(g)(6)(A) & (B). The Act therefore appears to conclusively eliminate TikTok Inc.'s ability to speak through its editorial and publishing activities and through its own. account on the TikTok platform. 57. For similar reasons, the Act burdens the First Amendment rights of other ByteDance subsidiaries to reach their U.S. user audiences, (Page 35 of Total) 34

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 36 of 70 since those companies are likewise prohibited from speaking and engaging in editorial activities on other ByteDance applications. 58. The Act is subject to strict scrutiny. The Act's restrictions on Petitioners' First Amendment rights are subject to strict scrutiny for three independent reasons. 59. First, the Act represents a content- and viewpoint-based restriction on protected speech. The Act discriminates on a content basis because it exempts platforms "whose primary purpose" is to host specific types of content: "product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews.” Sec. 2(g)(2)(B). The Act thus “distinguish[es] favored speech" - i.e., speech concerning travel information and business reviews "from disfavored speech" ―i.e., all other types of - speech, including particularly valuable speech like religious and political content. Turner Broad. Sys., Inc. v. FCC, 512 U.S. 622, 643 (1994). 60. The Act also discriminates on a viewpoint basis because it appears to have been enacted at least in part because of concerns over the viewpoints expressed in videos posted on TikTok by users of the platform. For example, the House Committee Report asserted, without supporting evidence, that Tik Tok "can be used by [foreign adversaries] to 35 (Page 36 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 37 of 70 push misinformation, disinformation, and propaganda on the American public" 19 a concern that in any event could be raised about any platform for user-generated content. See infra ¶¶82, 87. Similarly, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, who co-sponsored the Act, expressed the unsubstantiated concern that “the platform continued to show dramatic differences in content relative to other social media platforms."20 61. Second, the Act discriminates between types of speakers. As explained above, TikTok Inc. is a protected First Amendment speaker with respect to the TikTok platform. The Act facially discriminates between Tik Tok Inc. and other speakers depending on the "primary purpose” of the platforms they operate. Any application offered by Petitioners is automatically deemed a “foreign adversary controlled application,” without any exclusions or exceptions. Sec. 2(g)(3)(A). By contrast, any other company's application can be deemed a "foreign adversary controlled application” only if the company does not operate a 19 House Committee Report at 2. 20 Sapna Maheshwari, David McCabe & Annie Karni, House Passes Bill to Force Tik Tok Sale From Chinese Owner or Ban the App, N.Y. Times (Mar. 13, 2024), https://perma.cc/Z7UE-WYH6. (Page 37 of Total) 36

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 38 of 70 website or application "whose primary purpose is to allow users to post product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews." Sec. 2(g)(2)(B). The Act thus favors speakers that do offer such websites or applications over speakers that do not. 62. Moreover, the Act singles out TikTok Inc. and other subsidiaries of ByteDance for unique disfavor in other ways. Whereas other companies with ownership in a country deemed a "foreign adversary" become subject to the Act's restrictions only upon a presidential determination that the company poses "a significant threat to the national security of the United States,” Sec. 2(g)(3)(B), ByteDance Ltd. and its subsidiaries are automatically subject to the Act's draconian restrictions by fiat, Sec. 2(g)(3)(A). The standard and process that the Act specifies for every other company likely fall short of what is required. by the First Amendment and other applicable constitutional protections, but TikTok Inc. and ByteDance have been singled out for a dramatically different, even more clearly unconstitutional regime with no public notice, no process for a presidential determination that there is a significant national security threat, no justification of that determination by a public report and submission of classified evidence to Congress, and 37 - (Page 38 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 39 of 70 no judicial review for statutory and constitutional sufficiency based on the reasons set forth in the presidential determination. The Act also draws a speaker-based distinction insofar as it specifically names Byte Dance Ltd. and TikTok, and also exempts applications with fewer than 1 million monthly users (except if those applications are operated by ByteDance Ltd. or TikTok). Sec. 2(g)(2)(A)(ii), (3)(A). 63. A statutory restriction targeting specific classes of speakers is subject to strict scrutiny. See United States v. Playboy Ent. Grp., Inc., 529 U.S. 803, 812 (2000) ("Laws designed or intended to suppress or restrict the expression of certain speakers contradict basic First Amendment principles."). And that is especially true when, as here, the Act singles out Petitioners by name for uniquely disfavored treatment and congressional statements indicate that the Act targets Petitioners in part because of concerns about the content on TikTok. Because the Act "target[s]" both "speakers and their messages for disfavored treatment,” strict scrutiny review is required. Sorrell, 564 U.S. at 565; see also Turner, 512 U.S. at 658-60. 64. Third, the Act is subject to strict scrutiny as an unlawful prior restraint. The Supreme Court has "consistently" recognized in a "long 38 (Page 39 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 40 of 70 line" of cases that government actions that “deny use of a forum in advance of actual expression" or forbid “the use of public places [for plaintiffs] to say what they wanted to say" are prior restraints. Se. Promotions, Ltd. v. Conrad, 420 U.S. 546, 552-53 (1975). “[P]rior restraints on speech and publication are the most serious and the least. tolerable infringement on First Amendment rights." Nebraska Press Ass'n v. Stuart, 427 U.S. 539, 559 (1976). The Act suppresses speech in advance of its actual expression by prohibiting all U.S. TikTok users including Petitioner Tik Tok Inc. - from communicating on the platform. See Backpage.com, LLC v. Dart, 807 F.3d 229 (7th Cir. 2015) (defendant's conduct restricting the operator of classified advertising website was a prior restraint); Org. for a Better Austin v. Keefe, 402 U.S. 415, 418–19 (1971) (ban on distributing leaflets a prior restraint); U.S. WeChat Users All. v. Trump, 488 F. Supp. 3d 912, 926 (N.D. Cal. 2020) (ban on communications application a prior restraint). The same is true of other Byte Dance subsidiaries and their platforms. Such restrictions “bear[] a heavy presumption against [their] constitutional validity." Se. Promotions, 420 U.S. at 558. (Page 40 of Total) 39

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 41 of 70 65. The Act fails strict scrutiny because it does not further a compelling interest. Strict scrutiny “requires the Government to prove that the restriction [1] furthers a compelling interest and [2] is narrowly tailored to achieve that interest." Reed v. Town of Gilbert, 576 U.S. 155, 171 (2015) (numerical alterations added). "If a less restrictive alternative would serve the Government's purpose, the legislature must use that alternative." Playboy, 529 U.S. at 813. The Act fails on both counts. 66. The Act does not further a compelling interest. To be sure, national security is a compelling interest, but the government must show that the Act furthers that interest. To do so, the government "must do more than simply posit the existence of the disease sought to be cured." Turner, 512 U.S. at 664 (plurality op.). Rather, it “must demonstrate that the recited harms are real, not merely conjectural, and that the regulation will in fact alleviate these harms in a direct and material way." Id. 67. Congress itself has offered nothing to suggest that the TikTok platform poses the types of risks to data security or the spread of foreign propaganda that could conceivably justify the Act. The Act is devoid of 40 (Page 41 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 42 of 70 any legislative findings, much less a demonstration of specific harms that Tik Tok supposedly poses in either respect, even though the platform was first launched in 2017. 68. The statements of congressional committees and individual Members of Congress during the hasty, closed-door legislative process preceding the Act's enactment confirm that there is at most speculation, not "evidence,” as the First Amendment requires. Instead of setting out evidence that TikTok is actually compromising Americans' data security by sharing it with the Chinese government or spreading pro-China propaganda, the House Committee Report for an earlier version of the Act relies repeatedly on speculation that Tik Tok could do those things. See, e.g., House Committee Report at 6 (TikTok could “potentially [be] allowing the CCP 'to track the locations of Federal employees and contractors") (emphasis added) (quoting Exec. Order 13,942, 85 Fed. Reg. 48637, 48637 (Aug. 6, 2020)); id. at 8 (discussing "the possibility that the [CCP] could use [TikTok] to control data collection on millions of users") (emphasis added); id. ("Tik Tok has sophisticated capabilities that create the risk that [it] can ……. suppre[ss] statements and news that the PRC deems negative") (emphasis added). Speculative risk of harm is simply 41 (Page 42 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 43 of 70 not enough when First Amendment values are at stake. These risks are even more speculative given the other ways that the Chinese government could advance these asserted interests using a variety of intelligence tools and commercial methods. See infra 85–87. 69. The conjectural nature of these concerns are further underscored by President Biden's decision to continue to maintain a Tik Tok account for his presidential campaign even after signing the Act into law. 21 Congressional supporters of the Act have also maintained campaign accounts on TikTok. 22 This continued use of TikTok by President Biden and Members of Congress undermines the claim that the platform poses an actual threat to Americans. 70. Further, even if the government could show that TikTok or another ByteDance-owned application "push[es] misinformation, disinformation, and propaganda on the American public," House 21 Monica Alba, Sahil Kapur & Scott Wong, Biden Campaign Plans to Keep Using Tik Tok Through the Election, NBC News (Apr. 24, 2024), https://perma.cc/QPQ5-RVAD. 22 Tom Norton, These US Lawmakers Voted for Tik Tok Ban But Use It Themselves, Newsweek (Apr. 17, 2024), https://perma.cc/AQ5F-N8XQ. At least one Member created a TikTok account after the Act was enacted. See https://perma.cc/L3GT-7529. (Page 43 of Total) 42

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 44 of 70 Committee Report at 2, the government would still lack a compelling interest in preventing Americans from hearing disfavored speech. generated by TikTok users and shared on the platform just because the government considers it to be foreign "propaganda." See Lamont v. Postmaster Gen. of U.S., 381 U.S. 301, 305 (1965). 71. The Act also offers no support for the idea that other applications operated by subsidiaries of ByteDance Ltd. pose national security risks. Indeed, the legislative record contains no meaningful discussion of any ByteDance-owned application other than TikTok― let alone evidence “proving” that those other applications pose such risks. Reed, 576 U.S. at 171. 72. - The Act also provides neither support nor explanation for subjecting Petitioners to statutory disqualification by legislative fiat while providing every other platform, and users of other platforms, with a process that includes a statutory standard for disqualification, notice, a reasoned decision supported by evidence, and judicial review based on those specified reasons. Only Petitioners are subjected to a regime that has no notice and no reasoned decision supported by evidence - opening the door to, among other things, post-hoc arguments that may not have 43 (Page 44 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 45 of 70 been the basis for the government action. The Supreme Court recently explained that the requirement of a "reasoned explanation" is "meant to ensure that [the government] offer[s] genuine justifications for important decisions, reasons that can be scrutinized by courts and the interested public. Accepting contrived reasons would defeat the purpose of the enterprise." Dep't of Com. v. New York, 139 S. Ct. 2551, 2576 (2019). Depriving Petitioners of those protections imposes a dramatically heavier burden on the free speech rights of Petitioners and TikTok users that is wholly unjustified and certainly not supported by a compelling interest. The Act also fails strict scrutiny because it is not narrowly tailored. "Even where questions of allegedly urgent national security. . . are concerned," the government must show that "the evil that would result from the [restricted speech] is both great and certain and cannot be mitigated by less intrusive measures.” CBS, Inc. v. Davis, 510 U.S. 1315, 1317 (1994). To satisfy narrow tailoring, the Act must represent the least restrictive means to further the government's asserted data security and propaganda interests, Sable Commc'ns of Cal., Inc. v. FCC, 492 U.S. 115, 126 (1989), and be neither over- nor under- 73. (Page 45 of Total) 44

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 46 of 70 inclusive, Ark. Writers' Project, Inc. v. Ragland, 481 U.S. 221, 232 (1987). The Act fails in each of these respects. 74. The Act opts for a wholesale prohibition on Petitioners offering online applications in lieu of a multitude of less restrictive measures it could have taken instead. As discussed above, Petitioners have been involved in negotiations with CFIUS since 2019 over a package of measures that would resolve the government's concerns about data security and purported propaganda related to TikTok. The terms of that negotiated package are far less restrictive than an outright ban. The negotiations have resulted in the draft National Security Agreement, which Tik Tok Inc. is already in the process of voluntarily implementing to the extent it can do so without government action. That initiative includes a multi-billion-dollar effort to create a new TikTok U.S. subsidiary devoted to protecting U.S. user data and have U.S.-based Oracle Corporation store protected U.S. TikTok user data in the United States, run the TikTok recommendation system for U.S. users, and inspect TikTok's source code for security vulnerabilities. 75. If executed by the government, the National Security Agreement would also give CFIUS a "shut-down option" to suspend 45 (Page 46 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 47 of 70 Tik Tok in the United States in response to specified acts of noncompliance. The government has never meaningfully explained why the National Security Agreement (a far less restrictive alternative to an outright, total ban) is insufficient to address its stated concerns about data security and propaganda. 76. Even if the government's dissatisfaction with the draft. National Security Agreement were valid (despite the government never explaining why the agreement that the government itself negotiated is unsatisfactory), the CFIUS process in in which Petitioners have participated in good faith is geared toward finding any number of other less restrictive alternatives to an outright, total ban. The CFIUS member agencies could return to working with Petitioners to craft a solution that is tailored to meet the government's concerns and that is commercially, technologically, and legally feasible. Yet the government has not explained why the CFIUS process is not a viable alternative. 77. There are also a wide range of other less restrictive measures that Congress could have enacted. While many of these measures are themselves unjustified as applied to Petitioners, they nevertheless. illustrate that the Act does not select the least restrictive means to 46 (Page 47 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 48 of 70 further the national security goals that appear to have motivated it. For example, Congress could have addressed some members' stated concern about Tik Tok allegedly "track[ing] the locations of Federal employees and contractors" 23 by expanding the existing ban on government-owned devices to cover personal devices of federal employees and contractors. Or Congress could have enacted legislation to regulate TikTok's access to measures the Department of certain features on users' devices Homeland Security identified in 2020 as potential mitigations to "reduce the national security risks associated with" TikTok.24 78. Of course, Congress could also have decided not to single out a single speech platform (TikTok) and company (ByteDance Ltd.), and instead pursued any number of industry-wide regulations aimed at addressing the industry-wide issues of data security and content integrity. Congress could have enacted a data protection law governing transfers of Americans' sensitive data to foreign countries, similar to the 23 House Committee Report at 6. 24 Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency, Critical Infrastructure Security and Resilience Note, Appendix B: Department of Homeland Security Tik Tok and WeChat Risk Assessment 4 (Sept. 2, 2020). 47 (Page 48 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 49 of 70 strategy President Biden is currently pursuing through executive - the order. 25 Indeed, Congress did enact such a data-transfer law similarly named "Protecting Americans' Data from Foreign Adversaries Act of 2024" as the very next division of the legislation that contains the Act. Yet it chose to prohibit only “data broker[s]” from “mak[ing] available personally identifiable sensitive data of a United States. individual to any foreign adversary country or ... any entity that is controlled by a foreign adversary." H.R. 815, div. I, § 2(a), 118th Cong., Pub. L. No. 118-50 (Apr. 24, 2024). 79. There are also models for industry-wide regulation that Congress could have followed from other jurisdictions. For example, the European Union's Digital Services Act requires certain platforms to make disclosures about their content-moderation policies and to provide regulators and researchers with access to their data so those researchers can assess if the platforms are systemically promoting or suppressing 25 See Exec. Order 14, 117, 89 Fed. Reg. 15421 (Mar. 1, 2024). 48 (Page 49 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 50 of 70 content with particular viewpoints. 26 Congress pursued none of these alternatives. 80. Congress did not even provide Petitioners with the process and fact-finding protections that the Act extends to all other companies -protections which themselves likely fall short of what the Constitution mandates. Other companies receive prior notice, followed by a presidential determination of (and public report on) the national security threat posed by the targeted application, and the submission to Congress. of classified evidence supporting that determination, Sec. 2(g)(3)(B), which then is subject to judicial review based on the actual reasons for the decision, not post hoc rationalizations. 81. Because Congress failed to try any of these less restrictive measures, or at a minimum to explain why these alternatives would not address the government's apparent concerns, the Act is not narrowly tailored. 82. The Act independently fails strict scrutiny because it is both under- and over-inclusive. The Act is under-inclusive because it 26 EU Reg. 2022/2065 arts. 15, 40(4), 42(2). 49 (Page 50 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 51 of 70 ignores the many ways in which other companies. - both foreign and domestic can pose the same risks to data security and promotion of misinformation supposedly posed by Petitioners. The government "cannot claim" that banning some types of foreign owned applications is "necessary" to prevent espionage and propaganda “while at the same time" allowing other types of platforms and applications that may "create the same problem.” Reed, 576 U.S. at 172. Put differently, the Act's “[u]nderinclusiveness raises serious doubts about whether the government is in fact pursuing the interest it invokes, rather than disfavoring a particular speaker or viewpoint.” Brown v. Ent. Merchants Ass'n, 564 U.S. 786, 802 (2011). 83. Most glaringly, the Act applies only to Petitioners and certain other platforms that allow users to generate and view "text, images, videos, real-time communications, or similar content.” Sec. 2(g)(2)(A). The Act's coverage is thus triggered not by whether an application. collects users' data, but whether it shows them “content." Accordingly, there is no necessary relationship between the Act's scope and Congress's apparent concern with risks to Americans' data security, which could (Page 51 of Total) 50

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 52 of 70 equally be posed by personal finance, navigation, fitness, or many other types of applications. 84. The Act also singles out Petitioners by exempting all other companies that operate any website or application "whose primary purpose is to allow users to post product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews." Sec. 2(g)(2)(B). But the Act does not explain why such applications, when (i) “foreign adversary controlled” under the Act's broad definition; and (ii) determined by the President to be a significant national security threat, could not likewise be used to collect data from Americans such as Americans' location information - or to spread misinformation. Nor does the Act explain why an entire company presents no threat simply because it operates a single website or application the “primary purpose” of which is posting “product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews." Sec. 2(g)(2)(B). The Act's differential treatment of this favored category of websites and applications also disregards the fact that there is voluminous content on Tik Tok containing product reviews, business reviews, and travel information and reviews. Yet TikTok and all ByteDance applications are ineligible for this exclusion. 51 (Page 52 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 53 of 70 85. More broadly, the Act ignores the reality that much of the data collected by Tik Tok is no different in kind from the data routinely collected by other applications and sources in today's online world, including by American companies like Google, Snap, and Meta. The Act also ignores that foreign countries, including China, can obtain such information on Americans in other ways such as through open-source research and hacking operations. 86. Likewise, the House Committee Report on an earlier version of the Act speculates that allowing source code development in China "potentially exposes U.S. users to malicious code, backdoor vulnerabilities, surreptitious surveillance, and other problematic activities tied to source code development."27 But those supposed risks arise for each of the many American companies that employ individuals in China to develop code. The Act, however, does not seek to regulate, much less prohibit, all online applications offered by companies that have offices in China or that otherwise employ Chinese nationals as software developers. 28 27 House Committee Report at 5. 28 See, e.g., Karen Freifeld & Jonathan Stempel, Former Google Engineer 52 (Page 53 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 54 of 70 87. Nor does the Act seek to cut off numerous other ways that Americans could be exposed to foreign propaganda. For instance, the Act leaves foreign nationals (and even adversarial governments themselves) free to operate cable television networks in the United States, spread propaganda through accounts on other online platforms that enable the sharing of user-generated content, or distribute copies of state-run newspapers physically or over the Internet (including by software applications) in the United States. 29 Indicted for Stealing AI Secrets to Aid Chinese Companies, Reuters (Mar. 6, 2024), https://perma.cc/6LYE-64J6. 29 The U.S. government has recognized that foreign government. propaganda is an industry-wide challenge for online platforms. See, e.g., Nat'l Intel. Council, Declassified Intelligence Community Assessment, Foreign Threats to the 2020 US Federal Elections (Mar. 10, 2021), https://perma.cc/VD3Y-VXSB. YouTube, for example, added disclaimers to certain channels that were reportedly being used to spread disinformation on behalf of the Russian government. Paresh Dave & Christopher Bing, Russian Disinformation on YouTube Draws Ads, Lacks Warning Labels - Researchers, Reuters (June 7, 2019), https://perma.cc/2BEJ-VKGW. Like others in the industry, TikTok publishes transparency reports on attempts by users to use the platform for government propaganda purposes. See TikTok, Countering Influence Operations (last visited May 6, 2024), https://perma.cc/AB39-S8FJ. 53 (Page 54 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 55 of 70 88. The Act is also over-inclusive because it applies to other Byte Dance Ltd.-owned applications that Congress has not shown and could not possibly prove pose the risks the Act apparently seeks to address. - 89. At a minimum, the Act fails intermediate scrutiny. Even if strict scrutiny did not apply, the Act would still fail intermediate scrutiny as a time, place, and manner restriction: the Act prohibits speech activity on TikTok at all times, in all places, and in all manners anywhere across the United States. To pass intermediate scrutiny, a law must be "narrowly tailored to serve a significant governmental interest.” McCullen v. Coakley, 573 U.S. 464, 486 (2014). This means that it must not "burden substantially more speech than is necessary to further the government's legitimate interests," Turner, 512 U.S. at 661-62, and "leave open ample alternative channels for communication of the information," Clark v. Cmty. for Creative Non-Violence, 468 U.S. 288, 293 (1984). 90. For many of the same reasons the Act cannot satisfy strict scrutiny, it also cannot satisfy intermediate scrutiny: (Page 55 of Total) 54

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 56 of 70 91. As discussed supra ¶¶67-69, the government has failed to establish that its apparent data security and propaganda concerns with Tik Tok are non-speculative. And as discussed supra ¶¶ 73-81, the Act. burdens substantially more speech than necessary because there are many less restrictive alternatives Congress could have adopted to address any legitimate concerns. The Act also fails intermediate scrutiny because it “effectively prevents” TikTok Inc. “from reaching [its] intended audience" and thus "fails to leave open ample alternative means of communication." Edwards v. City of Coeur d'Alene, 262 F.3d 856, 866 (9th Cir. 2001). 92. Regardless of the level of scrutiny, the Act violates the First Amendment for two additional reasons. 93. The Act forecloses an entire medium of expression. First, by banning TikTok in the United States, the Act "foreclose[s] an entire medium of expression." City of Ladue v. Gilleo, 512 U.S. 43, 56 (1994). A "long line of Supreme Court cases indicates that such laws are almost never reasonable." Anderson v. City of Hermosa Beach, 621 F.3d 1051, 1064-65 (9th Cir. 2010). (Page 56 of Total) 55

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 57 of 70 94. The Act is constitutionally overbroad. Second, the Act is facially overbroad. A law is "overbroad if a substantial number of its. applications are unconstitutional, judged in relation to the statute's plainly legitimate sweep." United States v. Stevens, 559 U.S. 460, 473 (2010) (citation omitted). Here, for example, the government has never contended that all or even most of the content on TikTok (or any other Byte Dance-owned application) represents misinformation, or propaganda. Yet the Act shuts down all speech on ByteDance-owned applications at all times, in all places, and in all manners. That is textbook overbreadth. See, e.g., Bd. of Airport Comm'rs v. Jews for Jesus, Inc., 482 U.S. 569, 574–75 (1987). disinformation, Ground 2: Unconstitutional Bill of Attainder 95. The Act is an unconstitutional bill of attainder. Article I of the U.S. Constitution prohibits Congress from passing any bill of attainder. U.S. Const. art. I § 9, cl. 3 ("No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed."). A bill of attainder is "legislative punishment, of any form or severity, of specifically designated persons or groups." United States v. Brown, 381 U.S. 437, 447 (1965). The protection against bills of attainder is “an implementation of 56 (Page 57 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 58 of 70 the separation of powers, a general safeguard against legislative exercise of the judicial function, or more simply trial by legislature." Id. at 442. - 97. By singling out Petitioners for legislative punishment, the Act is an unconstitutional bill of attainder. 98. The Act inflicts "pains and penalties" that historically have been associated with bills of attainder. See Nixon v. Adm'r of Gen. Servs., 433 U.S. 425, 474 (1977). Historically, common "pains and penalties" included "punitive confiscation of property by the sovereign” and “a legislative enactment barring designated individuals or groups from participation in specified employments or vocations," among others. Id. As described above, the Act confiscates Petitioners' U.S. businesses by forcing ByteDance to shutter them within 270 days or sell on terms that are not commercially, technologically, or legally feasible. See supra ¶¶26-29. For the same reason, the Act bars Petitioners from operating in their chosen line of business. 99. "[V]iewed in terms of the type and severity of burdens imposed" on Petitioners, the Act's treatment of Petitioners cannot "reasonably ... be said to further nonpunitive legislative purposes." Nixon, 433 U.S. at 475–76. The Act transforms Petitioners into a “vilified 57 (Page 58 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 59 of 70 class" by explicitly prohibiting their current and future operations in the United States, without qualification or limitation, but does not extend the same treatment to other similarly situated companies. Foretich v. United States, 351 F.3d 1198, 1224 (D.C. Cir. 2003). 100. Moreover, in light of the less restrictive alternatives discussed above, there is no justification for automatically barring Petitioners' current and future operations in the United States (or those of its subsidiaries or successors) in perpetuity without providing them a meaningful opportunity to take corrective action. See Kaspersky Lab, Inc. v. U.S. Dep't of Homeland Sec., 909 F.3d 446, 456 (D.C. Cir. 2018). Indeed, the Act imposes this punishment uniquely on Petitioners without the process, and presidential determination of a significant national security threat, that Congress has afforded to everyone else. Expressly singling out Petitioners for these punitive burdens while at the same time adopting a statutory standard and decision-making process applicable to every other entity makes clear that Petitioners are subjected to a prohibited legislatively imposed punishment. 101. Moreover, while Petitioners can avoid the Act's prohibitions only via a wholesale divestment, all other companies 58 even those with (Page 59 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 60 of 70 Chinese ownership and determined by the President to present a "significant threat" to U.S. national security ― can avoid prohibition simply by operating a website or an application "whose primary purpose is to allow users to post product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews." Sec. 2(g)(2)(b). 102. Indeed, any other "adversary-controlled" company that operates an application exactly like TikTok, but also operates a website the primary purpose of which is to post product reviews, is left untouched, leaving a ready path for any company but those affiliated with Petitioners to circumvent the Act's prohibitions altogether. For all practical purposes, then, the Act applies to just one corporate group is a "Tik Tok bill," as congressional leaders have described it.30 - it 103. For all of these reasons, the Act constitutes an unconstitutional bill of attainder. 30 Rachel Dobkin, Mike Johnson's Letter Sparks New Flood of Republican Backlash, Newsweek (Apr. 17, 2024), https://perma.cc/Z5HD-7UVU (quoting letter from Speaker Johnson referencing the “TikTok_bill”); Senator Chuck Schumer, Majority Leader, to Colleagues (Apr. 5, 2024), https://perma.cc/J7Q4-9PGJ (referencing “TikTok legislation”). 59 (Page 60 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 61 of 70 Ground 3: Violation of Equal Protection 104. The Act also violates Petitioners' rights under the equal protection component of the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause because it singles Petitioners out for adverse treatment without any reason for doing so. 105. First, the Act deems any application offered by Petitioners to be a “foreign adversary controlled application" without notice or a presidential determination. Sec. 2(g)(3)(A). By contrast, applications offered by other companies "controlled by a foreign adversary" are deemed to be "foreign adversary controlled applications" only after notice. and a presidential determination that those companies present "significant threat[s]" to U.S. national security, a determination that must be supported by evidence submitted to Congress. Sec. 2(g)(2)(B); see supra 34(d). 106. That distinction imposes a dramatically heavier burden on Petitioners' free speech rights without any justification. The Act precludes the government from burdening the speech rights of any speakers other than Petitioners unless and until the President issues a public report on the specific national security concerns animating the 60 (Page 61 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 62 of 70 President's decision, provides support for that decision, and describes the assets requiring divestiture. Those protections ensure that the President must, at the very least, provide a detailed national security justification for his or her actions before burdening other speakers' speech a justification that then will provide the basis for judicial review. The Act imposes none of those requirements as a precondition for burdening Petitioners' speech it levies that burden by unexplained legislative fiat. — 107. Second, the Act denies Petitioners the exemption available to any other company that is purportedly “controlled by a foreign adversary." As noted, any application Petitioners offer is ipso facto deemed a "foreign adversary controlled application." By contrast, other companies "controlled by a foreign adversary" are exempt from the Act's definition of a "covered company," and thus from the Act's requirements, so long as they offer at least one application with the "primary purpose" of “allow[ing] users to post product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews." Sec. 2(g)(2)(B). 108. There is no conceivable reason for treating Petitioners differently than all other similarly situated companies. Even if Congress 61 (Page 62 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 63 of 70 had valid interests in protecting U.S. users' data and controlling what content may be disseminated through global platforms that would be advanced through the Act, there is no reason why those concerns would support a ban on Petitioners' platforms without corresponding bans on other platforms. Nor is there any rational reason why Congress would ban Petitioners' platforms while allowing any other company "controlled by a foreign adversary" - regardless of the national security threat posed by that company to sidestep the Act's reach by simply offering an - application that “allows users to post product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews," but changing nothing else about the company's operations, ownership structure, or other applications. 109. By treating Petitioners differently from others similarly situated, the Act denies Petitioners the equal protection of the law. Ground 4: Unconstitutional Taking 110. The Act effects an unlawful taking of private property without just compensation, in violation of the Fifth Amendment's Takings Clause. 111. The Takings Clause provides that “private property” shall not be "taken for public use, without just compensation." U.S. Const. amend. V, cl. 5. The Act does just that by shutting down ByteDance's 62 (Page 63 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 64 of 70 U.S. businesses or, to the extent any qualified divestiture alternative is even feasible (it is not), compelling ByteDance to sell those businesses. under fire-sale circumstances that guarantee inadequate compensation. 112. Petitioners have substantial property interests in, and associated with, their and their affiliates' U.S. operations. These include not only ByteDance Ltd.'s interest in TikTok Inc. and other U.S. businesses, but also the platforms and applications themselves. See Kimball Laundry Co. v. United States, 338 U.S. 1, 11–13 (1949) (Takings Clause also protects losses to going-concern value of business). 113. If the Act's prohibitions take effect, they will deprive Petitioners of property protected by the Takings Clause. Absent a qualified divestiture, the Act will shutter Petitioners' businesses in the United States. And even if a qualified divestiture were feasible (it is not), any sale could be, at best, completed only at an enormous discount to the U.S. businesses' current market value, given the forced sale conditions. See BFP v. Resol. Tr. Corp., 511 U.S. 531, 537 (1994) (“[M]arket value, as it is commonly understood, has no applicability in the forced-sale context; indeed, it is the very antithesis of forced-sale value."). (Page 64 of Total) 63

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 65 of 70 114. Because the Act compels ByteDance "to relinquish specific, identifiable property" or forfeit "all economically beneficial uses," the Act effects a per se taking. Horne v. Dep't of Agric., 576 U.S. 350, 364-65 (2015); Lucas v. S.C. Coastal Council, 505 U.S. 1003, 1019 (1992). 115. Alternatively, the Act inflicts a regulatory taking. Even when a law does not compel the physical invasion of property or deprive the property of all economically viable use, it still effects a taking "if [it] goes too far." Penn. Coal Co. v. Mahon, 260 U.S. 393, 415 (1922). In determining when a law "goes too far," courts have typically looked to "several factors" identified in Penn Central Transportation Co. v. City of New York, 438 U.S. 104, 124 (1978), namely, (a) “[t]he economic impact of the regulation”; (b) “the extent to which the regulation has interfered with reasonable investment-backed expectations"; and (c) "the character of the governmental action." The Act inflicts a regulatory taking under each of these three factors. 116. The Act does not compensate Petitioners (let alone provide just compensation) for the dispossession of their U.S. businesses. See United States v. Miller, 317 U.S. 369, 373 (1943). Prospective injunctive (Page 65 of Total) 64

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 66 of 70 relief is accordingly warranted. See, e.g., Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579, 585 (1952). Requested Relief relief: Petitioners respectfully request that this Court grant the following A. Issue a declaratory judgment that the Act violates the U.S. Constitution; B. Issue an order enjoining the Attorney General from enforcing the Act; C. Enter judgment in favor of Petitioners; and D. Grant any further relief that may be appropriate. (Page 66 of Total) 65

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 67 of 70 DATED: May 7, 2024 Andrew J. Pincus Avi M. Kupfer MAYER BROWN LLP 1999 K Street, NW Washington, DC 20006 Telephone: 202-263-3220 Email: [email protected] [email protected] Respectfully submitted, /s/ Alexander A. Berengaut Alexander A. Berengaut David M. Zionts Megan A. Crowley COVINGTON & BURLING LLP One CityCenter 850 Tenth Street, NW Washington, DC 20001 Telephone: (202) 662-6000 Email: [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] John E. Hall Anders Linderot COVINGTON & BURLING LLP The New York Times Building 620 Eighth Avenue New York, New York 10018 Telephone: (212) 841-1000 Email: [email protected] [email protected] Counsel for Petitioners (Page 67 of Total) 66

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 68 of 70 IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT TIKTOK INC., and BYTEDANCE LTD., V. ) Petitioners, No. 24-1113 MERRICK B. GARLAND, in his official capacity as Attorney General of the United States, Respondent. CORPORATE DISCLOSURE STATEMENT Petitioners state as follows: ByteDance Ltd. is a privately held corporation incorporated in the Cayman Islands. ByteDance Ltd. subsidiaries provide a suite of more than a dozen products and services that allow people to connect with, create, and consume content on the Internet. ByteDance Ltd. has no (Page 68 of Total) 1

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 69 of 70 parent company, and no publicly traded company owns 10% or more of Byte Dance Ltd.'s stock. Tik Tok Inc. is a California-incorporated company that provides the TikTok platform in the United States. TikTok Inc. is a wholly owned subsidiary of TikTok LLC, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of TikTok Ltd. TikTok Ltd. is a wholly owned subsidiary of ByteDance Ltd. TikTok Inc. has no other parent company, and no publicly held corporation owns 10% or more of its stock. (Page 69 of Total) 2 /s/Alexander A. Berengaut Alexander A. Berengaut Counsel for Petitioners

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 70 of 70 CERTIFICATE OF SERVICE I hereby certify that on this 7th day of May, I caused copies of the foregoing Petition for Review and Corporate Disclosure Statement to be served upon the following recipients. By certified mail, postage prepaid: Merrick B. Garland Attorney General of the United States U.S. Department of Justice 950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20530 By hand delivery: Matthew M. Graves United States Attorney 601 D Street, NW Washington, DC 20579 /s/ Alexander A. Berengaut Alexander A. Berengaut Counsel for Petitioners (Page 70 of Total)

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 1 of 7 (Page 71 of Total) EXHIBIT A

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 2 of 7 (Page 72 of Total) H. R. 815-61 Fusion Development Strategy programs of the People's Republic of China, including the following: (1) A brief summary of each such identified field and its relevance to the military power and national security of the People's Republic of China. (2) The implications for the national security of the United States as a result of the leadership or dominance by the People's Republic of China in each such identified field and associated supply chains. (3) The identification of at least 10 entities domiciled in, controlled by, or directed by the People's Republic of China (including any subsidiaries of such entity), involved in each such identified field, and an assessment of, with respect to each such entity, the following: (A) Whether the entity has procured components from any known United States suppliers. (B) Whether any United States technology imported by the entity is controlled under United States regulations. (C) Whether United States capital is invested in the entity, either through known direct investment or passive investment flows. (D) Whether the entity has any connection to the Peo- ple's Liberation Army, the Military-Civil Fusion program of the People's Republic of China, or any other state-spon- sored initiatives of the People's Republic of China to sup- port the development of national champions. (c) APPROPRIATE CONGRESSIONAL COMMITTEES DEFINED.-In this section, the term "appropriate congressional committees" means- (1) the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Rep- resentatives; (2) the Committee on Armed Services of the House of Representatives; (3) the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate; and (4) the Committee on Armed Services of the Senate. DIVISION H-PROTECTING AMERICANS FROM FOREIGN ADVERSARY CON- TROLLED APPLICATIONS ACT SEC. 1. SHORT TITLE. This division may be cited as the "Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act”. SEC. 2. PROHIBITION OF FOREIGN APPLICATIONS. ADVERSARY CONTROLLED (a) IN GENERAL.— (1) PROHIBITION OF FOREIGN ADVERSARY CONTROLLED APPLICATIONS.-It shall be unlawful for an entity to distribute, maintain, or update (or enable the distribution, maintenance, or updating of) a foreign adversary controlled application by carrying out, within the land or maritime borders of the United States, any of the following:

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 3 of 7 (Page 73 of Total) H. R. 815-62 (A) Providing services to distribute, maintain, or update such foreign adversary controlled application (including any source code of such application) by means of a marketplace (including an online mobile application store) through which users within the land or maritime borders of the United States may access, maintain, or update such application. (B) Providing internet hosting services to enable the distribution, maintenance, or updating of such foreign adversary controlled application for users within the land or maritime borders of the United States. (2) APPLICABILITY.-Subject to paragraph (3), this sub- section shall apply― (A) in the case of an application that satisfies the definition of a foreign adversary controlled application pursuant to subsection (g)(3)(A), beginning on the date that is 270 days after the date of the enactment of this division; and (B) in the case of an application that satisfies the definition of a foreign adversary controlled application pursuant to subsection (g)(3)(B), beginning on the date that is 270 days after the date of the relevant determination of the President under such subsection. (3) EXTENSION. With respect to a foreign adversary con- trolled application, the President may grant a 1-time extension of not more than 90 days with respect to the date on which this subsection would otherwise apply to such application pursuant to paragraph (2), if the President certifies to Congress that- (A) a path to executing a qualified divestiture has been identified with respect to such application; (B) evidence of significant progress toward executing such qualified divestiture has been produced with respect to such application; and (C) there are in place the relevant binding legal agree- ments to enable execution of such qualified divestiture during the period of such extension. (b) DATA AND INFORMATION PORTABILITY TO ALTERNATIVE APPLICATIONS.-Before the date on which a prohibition under sub- section (a) applies to a foreign adversary controlled application, the entity that owns or controls such application shall provide, upon request by a user of such application within the land or maritime borders of United States, to such user all the available data related to the account of such user with respect to such application. Such data shall be provided in a machine readable format and shall include any data maintained by such application with respect to the account of such user, including content (including posts, photos, and videos) and all other account information. (c) EXEMPTIONS.— (1) EXEMPTIONS FOR QUALIFIED DIVESTITURES.-Subsection (a)— (A) does not apply to a foreign adversary controlled application with respect to which a qualified divestiture is executed before the date on which a prohibition under subsection (a) would begin to apply to such application; and

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 4 of 7 (Page 74 of Total) H. R. 815-63 (B) shall cease to apply in the case of a foreign adversary controlled application with respect to which a qualified divestiture is executed after the date on which a prohibition under subsection (a) applies to such applica- tion. (2) EXEMPTIONS FOR CERTAIN NECESSARY SERVICES.-Sub- sections (a) and (b) do not apply to services provided with respect to a foreign adversary controlled application that are necessary for an entity to attain compliance with such sub- sections. (d) ENFORCEMENT.— (1) CIVIL PENALTIES.― (A) FOREIGN ADVERSARY CONTROLLED APPLICATION VIO- LATIONS. An entity that violates subsection (a) shall be subject to pay a civil penalty in an amount not to exceed the amount that results from multiplying $5,000 by the number of users within the land or maritime borders of the United States determined to have accessed, maintained, or updated a foreign adversary controlled application as a result of such violation. (B) DATA AND INFORMATION VIOLATIONS.-An entity that violates subsection (b) shall be subject to pay a civil penalty in an amount not to exceed the amount that results from multiplying $500 by the number of users within the land or maritime borders of the United States affected by such violation. (2) ACTIONS BY ATTORNEY GENERAL.-The Attorney Gen- eral- (A) shall conduct investigations related to potential violations of subsection (a) or (b), and, if such an investiga- tion results in a determination that a violation has occurred, the Attorney General shall pursue enforcement under paragraph (1); and (B) may bring an action in an appropriate district court of the United States for appropriate relief, including civil penalties under paragraph (1) or declaratory and injunctive relief. (e) SEVERABILITY.― (1) IN GENERAL.-If any provision of this section or the application of this section to any person or circumstance is held invalid, the invalidity shall not affect the other provisions or applications of this section that can be given effect without the invalid provision or application. (2) SUBSEQUENT DETERMINATIONS.-If the application of any provision of this section is held invalid with respect to a foreign adversary controlled application that satisfies the definition of such term pursuant to subsection (g)(3)(A), such invalidity shall not affect or preclude the application of the same provision of this section to such foreign adversary con- trolled application by means of a subsequent determination pursuant to subsection (g)(3)(B). (f) RULE OF CONSTRUCTION.-Nothing in this division may be construed― (1) to authorize the Attorney General to pursue enforce- ment, under this section, other than enforcement of subsection (a) or (b);

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 5 of 7 (Page 75 of Total) H. R. 815-64 (2) to authorize the Attorney General to pursue enforce- ment, under this section, against an individual user of a foreign adversary controlled application; or (3) except as expressly provided herein, to alter or affect any other authority provided by or established under another provision of Federal law. (g) DEFINITIONS.-In this section: (1) CONTROLLED BY A FOREIGN ADVERSARY.-The term "con- trolled by a foreign adversary" means, with respect to a covered company or other entity, that such company or other entity is- (A) a foreign person that is domiciled in, is headquartered in, has its principal place of business in, or is organized under the laws of a foreign adversary country; (B) an entity with respect to which a foreign person or combination of foreign persons described in subpara- graph (A) directly or indirectly own at least a 20 percent stake; or (C) a person subject to the direction or control of a foreign person or entity described in subparagraph (A) or (B). (2) COVERED COMPANY.— (A) IN GENERAL.—The term "covered company" means an entity that operates, directly or indirectly (including through a parent company, subsidiary, or affiliate), a website, desktop application, mobile application, or aug- mented or immersive technology application that— (i) permits a user to create an account or profile to generate, share, and view text, images, videos, real- time communications, or similar content; (ii) has more than 1,000,000 monthly active users with respect to at least 2 of the 3 months preceding the date on which a relevant determination of the President is made pursuant to paragraph (3)(B); (iii) enables 1 or more users to generate or dis- tribute content that can be viewed by other users of the website, desktop application, mobile application, or augmented or immersive technology application; and (iv) enables 1 or more users to view content gen- erated by other users of the website, desktop applica- tion, mobile application, or augmented or immersive technology application. (B) EXCLUSION.—The term “covered company” does not include an entity that operates a website, desktop applica- tion, mobile application, or augmented or immersive tech- nology application whose primary purpose is to allow users to post product reviews, business reviews, or travel information and reviews. a (3) FOREIGN ADVERSARY CONTROLLED APPLICATION.―The term "foreign adversary controlled application" means website, desktop application, mobile application, or augmented or immersive technology application that is operated, directly or indirectly (including through a parent company, subsidiary, or affiliate), by— (A) any of (i) ByteDance, Ltd.;

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 6 of 7 (Page 76 of Total) (ii) TikTok; H. R. 815-65 (iii) a subsidiary of or a successor to an entity identified in clause (i) or (ii) that is controlled by a foreign adversary; or (iv) an entity owned or controlled, directly or indirectly, by an entity identified in clause (i), (ii), or (iii); or (B) a covered company that- (i) is controlled by a foreign adversary; and (ii) that is determined by the President to present a significant threat to the national security of the United States following the issuance of (I) a public notice proposing such determina- tion; and (II) a public report to Congress, submitted not less than 30 days before such determination, describing the specific national security concern involved and containing a classified annex and a description of what assets would need to be divested to execute a qualified divestiture. (4) FOREIGN ADVERSARY COUNTRY.-The term “foreign adversary country" means a country specified in section 4872(d)(2) of title 10, United States Code. (5) INTERNET HOSTING SERVICE.―The term "internet hosting service" means a service through which storage and computing resources are provided to an individual or organiza- tion for the accommodation and maintenance of 1 or more websites or online services, and which may include file hosting, domain name server hosting, cloud hosting, and virtual private server hosting. (6) QUALIFIED DIVESTITURE.—The term "qualified divesti- ture" means a divestiture or similar transaction that- (A) the President determines, through an interagency process, would result in the relevant foreign adversary controlled application no longer being controlled by a for- eign adversary; and (B) the President determines, through an interagency process, precludes the establishment or maintenance of any operational relationship between the United States operations of the relevant foreign adversary controlled application and any formerly affiliated entities that are controlled by a foreign adversary, including any cooperation with respect to the operation of a content recommendation algorithm or an agreement with respect to data sharing. (7) SOURCE CODE.-The term "source code" means the com- bination of text and other characters comprising the content, both viewable and nonviewable, of a software application, including any publishing language, programming language, pro- tocol, or functional content, as well as any successor languages or protocols. (8) UNITED STATES.-The term "United States" includes the territories of the United States. SEC. 3. JUDICIAL REVIEW. (a) RIGHT OF ACTION.-A petition for review challenging this division or any action, finding, or determination under this division

USCA Case #24-1113 Document #2053212 Filed: 05/07/2024 Page 7 of 7 (Page 77 of Total) H. R. 815-66 may be filed only in the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. (b) EXCLUSIVE JURISDICTION.-The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit shall have exclusive jurisdiction over any challenge to this division or any action, finding, or determination under this division. (c) STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS.-A challenge may only be brought― (1) in the case of a challenge to this division, not later than 165 days after the date of the enactment of this division; and (2) in the case of a challenge to any action, finding, or determination under this division, not later than 90 days after the date of such action, finding, or determination. DIVISION I-PROTECTING AMERICANS' DATA FROM FOREIGN ADVERSARIES ACT OF 2024 SEC. 1. SHORT TITLE. This division may be cited as the "Protecting Americans' Data from Foreign Adversaries Act of 2024". SEC. 2. PROHIBITION ON TRANSFER OF PERSONALLY IDENTIFIABLE SENSITIVE DATA OF UNITED STATES INDIVIDUALS TO FOR- EIGN ADVERSARIES. (a) PROHIBITION.-It shall be unlawful for a data broker to sell, license, rent, trade, transfer, release, disclose, provide access to, or otherwise make available personally identifiable sensitive data of a United States individual to- (1) any foreign adversary country; or (2) any entity that is controlled by a foreign adversary. (b) ENFORCEMENT BY FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION.― (1) UNFAIR OR DECEPTIVE ACTS OR PRACTICES.-A violation of this section shall be treated as a violation of a rule defining an unfair or a deceptive act or practice under section 18(a)(1)(B) of the Federal Trade Commission Act (15 U.S.C. 57a(a)(1)(B)). (2) POWERS OF COMMISSION.― (A) IN GENERAL.-The Commission shall enforce this section in the same manner, by the same means, and with the same jurisdiction, powers, and duties as though all applicable terms and provisions of the Federal Trade Commission Act (15 U.S.Č. 41 et seq.) were incorporated into and made a part of this section. (B) PRIVILEGES AND IMMUNITIES.-Any person who vio- lates this section shall be subject to the penalties and entitled to the privileges and immunities provided in the Federal Trade Commission Act. (3) AUTHORITY PRESERVED.-Nothing in this section may be construed to limit the authority of the Commission under any other provision of law. (c) DEFINITIONS.-In this section: (1) COMMISSION.-The term "Commission" means the Fed- eral Trade Commission.