Title: Supreme Court Considers President's Authority to Impose Tariffs
A challenge to US President Donald Trump’s use of emergency powers to impose tariffs has made it all the way to the US Supreme Court. It’s the culmination of three lawsuits filed by tariff-hit businesses and twelve states. The court’s decision could undo a key Trump policy and force the US government to refund some of the billions in revenue it’s already raked in.
But a high-ranking Justice Department official says the law Trump invoked, the IEEPA, implies the power to impose tariffs, and that Trump believes undoing the tariffs could cause the US deep harm.
D. John Sauer (US SOLICITOR GENERAL):
Unwinding those agreements, he warns, would expose us to ruthless trade retaliation by far more aggressive countries and drive America from strength to failure with ruinous economic and national security consequences.
But no other president has used this law to impose tariffs before. And, with the US Constitution giving Congress, not the President, authority over tariffs and taxes, justices ranging from the liberal minority to the conservative majority are skeptical. Some say the IEEPA was never intended to give the president such powers.
Ketanji Brown Jackson (ASSOCIATE US SUPREME COURT JUSTICE):
It's pretty clear that Congress was trying to constrain the emergency powers of the president in IEEPA. So it seems a little inconsistent to say that we have to interpret a statute that was designed to constrain presidential authority, consistent with an understanding that Congress wanted the president to have essentially unlimited authority.
Even some Trump nominees have reservations about whether the separation of powers might be eroded beyond repair.
Neil Gorsuch (ASSOCIATE US SUPREME COURT JUSTICE):
Congress as a practical matter can’t get this power back once it’s handed it over to the president. It’s a one-way ratchet toward the gradual but continual accretion of power in the executive branch and away from the people's elected representatives.
Chief Justice John Roberts, a conservative with a wildcard reputation, made similar points.
John Roberts (US SUPREME COURT CHIEF JUSTICE):
Yes, of course, tariffs in dealings with foreign powers. But the vehicle is imposition of taxes, on, on Americans. And that has always been the core power of Congress. So, to have the president's foreign affairs power trump that that basic power for Congress, seems to me to kind of at least neutralize, between the two powers, the executive power and the legislative power.
This is just the start of deliberations—and the court could in the end rule any way. And despite the skepticism from justices, Trump’s officials are upbeat.
Scott Bessent (US TREASURY SECRETARY):
Sometimes the best tariffs are the ones that never get enforced. The President threatened 100 percent tariffs on the Chinese, after the Chinese on October 8th threatened to put export controls on rare earth magnets from Chinese products that had point zero one percent -- every camera, every iPhone, would have been subject to Chinese control. Because he had the ability to threaten 100 percent tariffs, he was able to successfully execute on foreign policy.
Even if the court does rule against Trump, it won’t spell the end of US tariffs. There are other Trump administration tariffs that this case won’t consider. And there are other laws Trump could use to keep tariffs up—even if the speed and intensity are restricted.
Still, after backing Trump policies in a string of decisions this year, the court seems ready to at least consider putting a check on the president.
Andy Hsueh and John Van Trieste for TaiwanPlus.
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