Supreme Court rejects Trump’s tariffs as illegal import taxes
WASHINGTON— The Supreme Court ruled Friday that President Trump’s sweeping tariffs around the world are illegal and cannot stand without approval from Congress.
6-3 decision He handed Trump his most important defeat in the Supreme Court.
Last year, judges issued temporary orders to block some of his initiatives; But Friday’s ruling was the first to find the president exceeded his legal authority.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., speaking for the court, said Congress has the authority to impose taxes and tariffs, and lawmakers did not do so in an emergency bill that did not mention tariffs.
“The President asserts that he has extraordinary authority to unilaterally impose tariffs of unlimited amount, duration, and scope. In light of the scope, history, and constitutional context of the asserted authority, he must establish clear congressional authority to exercise it,” he wrote.
“And no President has ever read the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to grant such authority. We claim no special authority over economics or foreign affairs. We claim only the limited role granted to us by Article III of the Constitution. In exercising this role, we believe that IEEPA does not authorize the President to impose tariffs,” Roberts wrote.
In his concurring opinion, Justice Neil M. Gorsuch emphasized the role of Congress.
“The Constitution vests the Nation’s lawmaking power in Congress alone,” he said.
Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito and Brett M. Kavanaugh dissented.
Trump claimed his new, ever-changing tariffs would bring trillions of dollars in revenue to the government and encourage more manufacturing in the United States.
But employment in manufacturing fell last year, in part because American companies were hurt by the high cost of parts they import.
Critics said the new taxes particularly hurt small businesses and raised prices for American consumers.
The justices focused on the president’s claimed legal authority to impose tariffs in response to an international economic emergency.
Several small business owners filed lawsuits last year claiming Trump’s import tariffs were illegal and disruptive.
Illinois-based Learning Resources, which sells educational toys for children, said it would have to increase its prices by 70 percent because most of its toys are produced in Asia.
A separate lawsuit was filed by Terry Precision Cycling, a New York wine importer and seller of cycling clothing for women.
Both cases won in lower courts. The justices said the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act that Trump cited made no mention of tariffs and had not previously been used to impose such import duties.
The law says the president can deal with an “unusual and extraordinary threat” by freezing assets or imposing sanctions on a foreign country or otherwise regulating trade in response to a national emergency.
Trump has said the nation’s long-running trade deficit is an emergency and tariffs are an appropriate adjustment.
While lower courts rejected Trump’s claims, he left Trump’s tariffs in place, and the administration appealed the case to the Supreme Court.
