By 6-3 Vote, Supreme Court Rules All of Trump's Tariffs Illegal

Of course Roberts and Coney-Barrett joined the left. I don't know why we say "joined the left." They're on the left.

Just going to guess that the libertarian Gorsuch also joined the left. (Update: He did. Actually I also just guessed that the liberal cooze Coney-Barrett once again joined the left, and that guess was right as well. Although it's barely a "guess," is it?)

Terrible.

The Supreme Court struck down President Donald Trump's far-reaching global tariffs on Friday, handing him a significant loss on an issue crucial to his economic agenda.

The 6-3 decision centers on tariffs imposed under an emergency powers law, including the sweeping "reciprocal" tariffs he levied on nearly every other country.

It's the first major piece of Trump's broad agenda to come squarely before the nation's highest court, which he helped shape with the appointments of three conservative jurists in his first term.

The majority found that the Constitution "very clearly" gives Congress the power to impose taxes, which include tariffs. "The Framers did not vest any part of the taxing power in the Executive Branch," Chief Justice John Roberts wrote.

Except that Congress has also been determined to have the power to delegate this power to Executive decision-making -- which is exactly what Congress did, in granting the President the power to "regulate... importation" in the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.

Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh dissented.

"The tariffs at issue here may or may not be wise policy. But as a matter of text, history, and precedent, they are clearly lawful," Kavanaugh wrote.

Trump called the majority decision "a disgrace" when he was notified during his morning meeting with several governors, according to someone with direct knowledge of the president's reaction, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private conversation.

...

The majority did not address whether companies could get refunded for the billions they have collectively paid in tariffs. Many companies, including the big-box warehouse chain Costco, have already lined up to demand refunds in lower courts. Kavanaugh noted the process could be complicated.

"The Court says nothing today about whether, and if so how, the Government should go about returning the billions of dollars that it has collected from importers. But that process is likely to be a 'mess,' as was acknowledged at oral argument," he wrote.

The Treasury had collected more than $133 billion from the import taxes the president has imposed under the emergency powers law as of December, federal data shows. The impact over the next decade was estimated at some $3 trillion.

Gunther Eagleman @GuntherEagleman

16m

🚨BREAKING: Justice Clarence Thomas just UNLEASHED pure FIRE in his dissent on the tariff ruling, dropping TRUTH BOMBS that expose the majority's BS and defend President Trump's America First authority like a boss!

He didn't mince words. He straight-up NAILED it:

"NEITHER the statutory text nor the Constitution provide a basis for ruling against the President."

BOOM. Read that again. The Constitution and the law ITSELF back Trump--no ifs, ands, or buts.

Thomas keeps swinging:

"Congress authorized the President to 'regulate . . . importation.' Throughout American history, the authority to 'regulate importation' has been understood to include the authority to impose duties on imports."

Historical facts don't care about your feelings, globalists.

He doubles down:

"The meaning of that phrase was beyond doubt by the time that Congress enacted this statute, shortly after President Nixon's highly publicized duties on imports were UPHELD based on identical language."

Nixon did it. Courts said YES. Same exact words. Case closed.

Then the kill shot:

"The statute that the President relied on therefore authorized him to impose the duties on imports at issue in these cases."

Crystal. Clear.

Cynical Publius @CynicalPublius

19m

So let me get this straight. Congress can totally delegate extreme, life-changing powers to rogue federal executive agencies like the EPA for 50+ years, but it cannot delegate tariff power to the President?

I know the laws governing the two issues are not the same, but the absurd inconsistency is the only thing laymen see.

Actually, Justice Gorsuch seems to be driving at that in his concurrence. There is a question about whether Congress even has the power to delegate its constitutional powers. Prior rulings that it can do this is what empowered the gigantic leviathan state we now live in. Some people want to overturn that system of congressional delegation of the powers the Constitution grants solely to it.

Gorsuch wants to know why the liberal justices want to read this and only this statute of being incapable of granting the president congressional powers, while permitting every other statute to delegate equal powers to the president. He seems to want to go further and overturn the entire system of Congress granting the Executive law-making power so it can churn out Infinite Laws, and mocks the majority for keeping that system in place while finding a violation only with Trump's use of congressionally-delegated power.

Despite the ruling, many commentators point out that the Supreme Court only denied Trump's power to lay tariffs based upon the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) -- which, of course, actually authorizes the president to "regulate... importation" -- but there are other statutory bases for this power that Trump can now assert.

Dirty libertarian open-borders queerbaits at Cato praise the decision, but they also warn that Trump may just reassert this authority under a different statue.

The Supreme Court's decision to strike down President Trump's International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) tariffs is a welcome victory for constitutional governance and the rule of law. But anyone hoping this spells the end of the administration's tariff spree should think twice. Even without IEEPA, the president retains ample statutory authority to quickly recreate much of the current trade policy chaos.

Some of these are familiar. During Trump's first term, he invoked Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 and Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 to hit China and impose steel and aluminum tariffs. Yet US law provides other tools that have largely escaped notice. Two lesser-known provisions--Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 and Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930--could let the administration continue its tariff onslaught even without IEEPA.

Sean Davis @seanmdav

32m

The Supreme Court's decision against Trump's emergency tariffs is a complete mess, both as a matter of logic and construction, as the opinion has different majorities in different sections. The justices themselves couldn't even consistently agree on the ruling.

As Kavanaugh notes in his dissent, the decision effectively means Trump may unilaterally ban all foreign imports (an infinite tariff for all intents and purposes) on an emergency basis, but may not levy a $0.01 tariff on any good. You don't have to be a lawyer to see how stupid and illogical that is.

But given his Obamacare decision, Roberts has made clear that stupid and illogical is the defining characteristic of Roberts' tenure as chief justice.

Varad Mehta @varadmehta

It's gonna be weird next week when Trump reimposes most of his tariffs and all the people celebrating their demise today are like, wait a minute.

I would not count on that. If the Court wants to "save" a position, they will often search statutes and laws themselves -- sua sponte, on their own initiative -- and find alternate bases for justifying that position. That is, if the liberals on the Court were willing to consider alternate legislative authority for Trump's tariffs, they already would have considered it and ruled differently. They would have said that while Trump cannot rely on the IEEPA for imposing tariffs, he can rely on other legislative language.

The fact that they did not do so and were brazen enough to overturn the clearly expressed will of the American voters tells me they will negate all subsequent assertions by Trump to have the tariff power under alternate parts of the US Code.

posted by Disinformation Expert Ace at 12:10 PM

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