They absolutely could if the NYT was fully owned by a foreign entity, and that entity was a government that adversarial to the US.

The issue is not that a company has foreign shareholders -- it's the fact that is under the control of the CCP.

This was also an issue when Rupert Murdoch wanted to buy Fox; he was only able to do so once he became a US citizen, for the same reasons.

The 1A arguments by ByteDance was a diversionary tactic to shift the conversation away from the real issue (control) -- and judging by all the comments on HN by people who don't understand it's about control, I'd say they were pretty successful.