The federal Court of International Trade has ruled that the Trump Administration exceeded its authority in levying “emergency” tariffs on virtually every country in the world, as well as in imposing fentanyl-related tariffs on China, Mexico, and Canada. We have embedded a copy of the opinion at the end of the post (hat tip Gordon H). We hope you can take the time to read it.
Some background from the Financial Times:
Under the US constitution, Congress has the power to set tariffs. But the Trump administration has said the International Emergency Economic Powers Act gives the president the power to do so if there is a declared national emergency.
In declaring a national emergency in his executive order on April 2, Trump cited factors including a lack of reciprocity in bilateral trade relationships, and US trading partners’ policies that suppress domestic wages, amounted to an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to the US economy and to national security.
The court cases challenged his use of those powers
.
A U.S. trade court blocked President Donald Trump’s tariffs from going into effect in a sweeping ruling on Wednesday that found the president overstepped his authority by imposing across-the-board duties on imports from U.S. trading partners.
The Court of International Trade said the U.S. Constitution gives Congress exclusive authority to regulate commerce with other countries that is not overridden by the president’s emergency powers to safeguard the U.S. economy….
The judges also ordered the Trump administration to issue new orders reflecting the permanent injunction within 10 days. The Trump administration minutes later filed a notice of appeal and questioned the authority of the court.
The court invalidated with immediate effect all of Trump’s orders on tariffs since January that were rooted in the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), a law meant to address “unusual and extraordinary” threats during a national emergency.
The court was not asked to address some industry-specific tariffs Trump has issued on automobiles, steel and aluminum, using a different statute.
Additional detail from The Hill:
Wednesday’s ruling blocks Trump’s April 2 “Liberation Day” tariffs, which placed a 10 percent levy on all imports and higher reciprocal tariffs for dozens of countries. It also blocks earlier orders that imposed tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China. Many had been adjusted as or delayed as stocks fell and Treasury yields rose in the wake of Trump’s trade shifts.
The judges gave the Trump administration 10 days to issue any administrative orders needed to effectuate their ruling.
The Administration appealed the ruling Wednesday evening, but the excerpts in The Hill give the impression that it’s a handwave, a mere reassertion of arguments made in the trade court filing.
This reversal comes as Trump is floundering. His approval ratings remain poor, particularly so early in this term.1
Elon Musk has had to abandon DOGE due to blowback to Tesla sales and resulting shareholder demands. Musk has gone from ally to critic, complaining that Trump’s “big beautiful bill” undermines DOGE, just when it barely passed in the House and there’s considerable Senate opposition. For instance, Josh Hawley has just positioned himself as defender in chief of Medicaid, standing against Trump’s planned cuts.
In a potentially bigger blow, Musk, who was a major Trump funder in 2024, says he plans to greatly reduce his political spending. One wonders how many Congresscritters will be prepared to stick their necks out for Trump when his money sources are pulling away.
Similarly, on the Project Ukraine front, Trump has been unable to bring Ukraine or Russia to heel, which is pretty embarrassing given that Ukraine is on US-provided life support. Alexander Mercouris said in his last show that those who know Trump say he wants to wash his hands of the matter and seeks to exit, probably imposes token additional sanctions so as to placate hawks like Lindsey Graham on the way out.
The fact that these two big tariff salvos have been nixed by the court does not mean Trump is bereft of options. We’ll turn to those first.
However, the fact that Trump is having to fight for the authority to use tariffs with a bludgeon, will be delayed, and may wind up considerably restricted in their scope and level, reduces both his bargaining leverage and his credibility.
There is also the wee question of what happens to the tariffs collected, and the impact on his big beautiful bill and the US deficit if Trump looks less likely to impose broad tariffs. Bloomberg points out that the Administration collected a record $16.5 billion in April. Admittedly, this total includes Trump 1.0 tariffs as well as unaffected duties on steel and aluminum. But unless the Administration wins its appeal, a lot of these monies collected would need to be refunded. Oopsie!
Less tariff revenue means funding needs to come from somewhere else, unless the US deficit is to rise even faster, an outcome Mr. Market, the Fed, many voters, and thus many Congresscritters, view with considerable disapproval. Bloomberg added:
If the ruling isn’t reversed or ignored, one of the consequences could be greater fiscal concerns at a time when bond markets are questioning the trajectory of the US’s mounting debt load. The Trump administration has been citing increased tariff revenues as a way to offset tax cuts in his “one big, beautiful bill” now before Congress, which is estimated to cost $3.8 trillion over the next decade.
Trump of course is appealing and seeking an injunction on the court’s order to implement a reversal in ten days. The ruling below strikes me as very tightly reasoned, so I don’t see the odds of it being reversed on appeal as good. If you accept that Congress circumscribed emergency tariff authority in the 1970s in a major dustup with the Nixon Administration (see the discussion of Yoshida I and II), you can’t buy the argument that this statute allows Trump to invoke emergency authority on his say-so and impose tariffs in a capricious manner (see his emotion-driven escalation with China).
CNBC sets forth some possible Trump’s fallbacks:
Economists at Goldman Sachs said the White House has a few tools at its disposal that could ensure it is only a temporary problem…
The Trump administration does have other legal means of imposing tariffs, however, according to Goldman. These include Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, Section 301 and Section 338 of the Trade Act of 1930.
Section 122 does not require a formal investigation and could therefore be one of the swiftest ways to get around the court roadblock.
“The administration could quickly replace the 10% across-the-board tariff with a similar tariff of up to 15% under Sec. 122,” analysts at Goldman said. They noted, however, that such a move would only last for up to 150 days after which law requires Congressional action.
Trump could also swiftly launch Section 301 investigations on key U.S. trading partners, laying the bureaucratic groundwork for tariffs, although Goldman said that this process will likely take several weeks at a minimum.
Section 232 tariffs, which are already in place for steel, aluminum and auto imports, could also be broadened to other sectors, while Section 338 allows the president to impose levies of up to 50% on imports from countries that discriminate against the U.S.
Goldman noted that the latter has not been used before.
A right-wing contact claimed that the Trump Administration had already been working on the investigations needed to support other means of deploying tariffs, and had reached for the emergency authority as the fastest way to get out of the box. Given the terrible caliber of Trump’s staff work on the foreign policy and immigration fronts, and that DOGE has been willy-nilly driving out seasoned Federal employees and that Trump has postured as if he is allergic to hiring consultants, one wonders if there are evidentiary baselines that these investigations must meet and whether the Team Trump will satisfy them.
Regardless, this Trump loss creates yet more uncertainty, which is anathema to businesses. From Axios:
What to watch: With tariffed goods arriving at U.S. ports every day, the confusion over what’s in force and what to charge could throw imports into chaos.
- Markets, and businesses, will likely be paying rapt attention in coming days to how the administration responds and whether higher courts intervene.
- “(It) gives foreign governments – once compelled to negotiate new terms of the trade agreements the Trump administration broke – significant new leverage in ongoing trade talks,” said Scott Lincicome, vice president of the Cato Institute’s Stiefel Center for Trade Policy Studies, in a statement.
The ruling is a dramatic twist in the trade wars that Trump launched in the early months of his presidency. Even if the ruling is appealed, it will for now embolden opponents of the tariffs in corporate America, foreign capitals and the US Congress who have been trying to persuade Trump to roll back the levies.
And what about all those trade negotiations? Recall that even the UK “deal” is only at the trade version of an agreement in principle. Again from Bloomberg:
Major trading partners including China, the European Union, India, and Japan that are in negotiations with the Trump’s administration must now decide whether to press ahead in efforts to secure deals or slow walk talks on the bet they now have a stronger hand…
Also thrown into doubt would be the outlines for a trade deal that Trump reached with the UK earlier in May. That potential pact calls for the imposition of a 10% US tariff on all imports from the UK that would be null and void if Wednesday’s decision endures.
“I don’t know why any country would want to engage in negotiations to get out of tariffs that have now been declared illegal,” said Jennifer Hillman, a Georgetown Law School professor and former WTO judge and general counsel for the US Trade Representative. “It’s a very definitive decision that the reciprocal worldwide tariffs are simply illegal.”
Importantly, Hillman said, the court had also ruled that Trump couldn’t just impose tariffs as leverage in a negotiation. “What the court is saying is creating leverage is not a legitimate use of tariffs,” she said. “To me it’s a very, very important decision.”
Hillman and other legal experts pointed out that Trump has other legal authorities he can draw on. But none would give him as broad powers as those he invoked under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA, that Trump has invoked.
In response, Trump Administration spokescritters have fallen back on screeching the tired trope of “unelected judges”. More worrisome is Trump looks to be increasingly going off the rails. I’m not the only one to notice it. Colonel Larry Wilkerson deemed the Trump “Putin is CRAZY” tweet followed by a threatening one to be either the work of out-of-control minions or an indicator of dementia. Wonder what he’ll make of this:
BREAKING: Trump issues a cryptic response to a court blocking his “Liberation Day” tariffs.
He’s gone completely mad. pic.twitter.com/ddFXjvvnzW
— Trump Lie Tracker (Commentary) (@MAGALieTracker) May 29, 2025
____
1 From Yahoo!:
00 V.O.S. DecisionA YouGov/The Economist poll conducted between May 23 and May 26 found that among registered voters, 46% approved of how Trump is handling his job as president, while 52% expressed disapproval.
Among U.S. adults surveyed, 44% approved of how Trump is managing things in the Oval Office, while 52% said they disapproved.
The survey found that Trump’s overall approval rating increased by a percentage point compared to the previous YouGov/The Economist poll, conducted between May 16 and May 19.
In that poll, 45% of registered voters approved Trump’s handling of the presidency and 52% said they disapproved. Among U.S. adults surveyed, 43% expressed approval, while 51% expressed disapproval.
Ask for forgiveness, not permission. That is the motto of our time.
From Trump, Biden, Boeing, Uber (local jitney laws), Tesla (state franchise laws) + too many banks and pharma cos. to name—-to the rando blowing through a stop sign in your neighborhood.
Why does anyone expect that this ruling will be enforced by Trump? What is going to stop him from imposing the tariffs anyway?
This will go to the Supreme Court and then we’ll see what really happens.
‘Himperial Presidency’
If you view it as an analogue of the Roman Republic transitioning into the Roman Empire it’s amazingly accurate as that was all about side-lining the senate. Of course it also side-lined the clienta system, Rome’s equivalent of representative democracy, and ended up turning the citizens into serfs.
the arc of the political-economy universe is to establish a feudal equilibrium (as top-heavy totalitarianism collapses under its own weight; and “pure” democracy has “collective action” problems) —- it’s like a black hole pulling in societies around it; it’s up to citizenry to steer clear of the event horizon. not holding my breath, lol
He can try, but I’m not sure what the mechanism for that would be. He can refuse to do things he’s ordered to, or do things he’s ordered not to, but other parties can refuse to comply, particularly when they have a court ruling on their side.
This isn’t like deportations, where he can send a bunch of goons around and bundle people onto a plane out of the country and refuse all orders to get them back. He could send a bunch of goons around to an importer to… do what? It’s not like tariffs are paid in suitcases full of cash, so there’s nothing to physically take possession of. If the importer refused to pay and cited the court decision, what then? Lock up any noncompliant staff? What would that accomplish, other than spawning a flurry of new legal actions? I just don’t see how he collects tariffs after this decision, even if he’s willing to break the law.
If he could gain control of the Federal payments systems to some degree, that might give him more options, and Nathan Tankus has been documenting some troubling developments there. But even in the worst case scenarios, I don’t think that would give him the power to reach into private bank accounts and take money, except potentially as a reversal of an earlier transaction (and NYC is in the process of challenging him over that one).
You really got that right. The rando part just put another nail in the coffin.
Copied over from links, I jumped the gun a bit when posting this comment there:
Completely separate from the legal questions, I wonder if this cripples the Presidency in terms of any ability to change economic course away from neo-liberal dogma. As misguided and ill-conceived as Trump’s trade policy has been, it was at least an attempt to effect change.
Stating that he usurped Congress’s authority is all well and good in a narrow legal sense. However, what the ruling does not address is that Congress itself is a fundamentally broken and corrupt institution. The founders never envisioned a scenario where bribery would become legalized (thanks, SCOTUS, heckuva job with Citizens United), in effect turning Congress into a vassal of corporations.
When one of the three branches is derelict in its duty to the Constitution, we cannot have a functional government. We’re left with a government that represents multinational corporations, not the people.
[ I recognize that the judicial branch is not the right place to address this. Obviously, they cannot declare Congress “null and void.” That would be judicial activism on steroids. ]
no. An imperial presidency allows Congress to outsource its work to the president, and pivot to easier grifting.
The obvious solution is simple, but requires work…im this day/age (air travel, Cannonball Run from Santa Monica to DC) there is no reason to give an executive emergency powers (on any topic) that last longer than 14 days (maybe with one 14 day extension). Period, after that Congress has to get back to work—even if it is a recess.
but that idea ia too utilitarian for DC; and Normies care about 1. economy; 2. culture wars; not the procedural semantics of power
Congress doesn’t seem to do much “work” anymore. Between insider trading, grifting a.k.a. fundraising, and such, I would guess that its essentially a work-free environment.
For example, they haven’t been able to pass a budget under regular order (no omnibus bills) since the Clinton administration.
Perhaps the President should have the power to sequester them in a room and confiscate all their devices so they can’t trade.
I like the sequester idea.
And getting the crypto freaks away from monetary policy needs to be handled ASAP.
Genius Act is not in trouble and more than a dozen dems are on board with it. So that’s great.
all 3 branches are derelict, and have been since the founding of the country. Do you really think congress wasn’t deeply corrupt before citizens united?
The US founders actually studied healthy cultures’ governments, with leaders who actually served the people, but they didn’t learn the important points. The founders learned about the separation of powers from them, which is well documented historically, but they thought you could still have a society of rich and poor, where a few people impose law and everyone else is expected to obey, and still have a just society with accountable leadership. That’s never worked in the history of humanity.
The founders were so used to their way of life that they didn’t understand key aspects of how the healthy cultures they studied were able to maintain a way of life with vanishingly low crime and corruption, with actual leader-servants, and with no rich and poor. Thus the American founders created a government every bit as corrupt as the monarchy they fought, only it was beholden to American rich people instead of British rich people.
Indeed. William Hogeland makes an excellent case in his recent book The Hamilton Scheme that the reason the US is such a money grubbing griftopia today is because that’s how the founders, particularly Hamilton, wanted it. There were people who stood up for a real small “d” democracy where everyone would be treated equally as opposed to having those with the most money calling the shots. Those righteous individuals were hippie punched into the dustbin of history 250 years ago.
Hickory: …only it was beholden to American rich people instead of British rich people.
If one looks at actual American colonial history rather than the myths, this is no surprise..
The Jeffersons, the Washingtons, and many of the families of the founding fathers were descendants of notable families on the losing Royalist side during the English civil war, who had then come to the American colonies to recreate their former neo-feudal estates with indentured servants, then African slaves.
The separation of powers means one thing: power dilution, in other words weak government. This ensures a power vacuum filled by private interests–constituting our present anarchy of production–that have no “separation of powers.” When conditions degrade such that they cannot be or won’t be managed by private interests, weak government’s unable to take the reins, which is why in times of trouble, republics retreat and why the Roman constitution included the dictatorship (the seed of its own destruction).
Republics, especially those with strong separation of powers, are such a poor form of government that they abolish themselves once the going gets tough. We’ve been witnessing for a rather long time the consequences of the defects of America’s creaky 18th century constitution. Though Americans are fond of attributing all their success to that constitution, I attribute it to the nation’s settler colonial character, having prospered enormously by conquered land and resources situated in a hospitable, temperate, 4-season climate lacking the proliferate diseases of the tropics. When things got really bad in the mid-to-late 19th century, the American state was able to save itself by sending the riff-raff west to complete the genocide of the native people there and garrison their stolen land.
Really, the coming world conflict is between two types of capitalist governance: the republic typified by America and the Leninist party state typified by China. So far, I’d say the Leninist party state has the upper hand, demonstrating that–apart from the communist program of the CPSU–Lenin created a governing structure more suited to modern capitalism, benefiting by rationalizing governance, than the 18th century republic.
So, should we look forward to the most rapid collapse of the current regime – meaning the u.s. constitutional government? Or would that be too soon, leading only an even more totalitarian rich/poor division style of society here in the “west?” If I understand my readings of Caitlin Johnston, as one example, a further or more complete revolution in the consciousness of the people is a prerequisite to any more equitable society and government. Which I am unlikely to live long enough to see?
And there was a more Democratic example, the Pennsylvania Constitution, which both the states’ rights crowd and the federalism crowd hated and ultimately rewrote.
Yes. The 1787 constitution was instituted after what amounted to a coup to overthrow actual democracy with the specific purpose of creating a corruptible environment for the rich. It has been so ever since. Allowing capitalists to exist will ALWAYS trend toward the same end state. Capitalism is an unstable system that will gravitate toward tyrannical Fascism. You can push the clock backwards, such as was done during the 30’s, but the hands simply resume their march forward to the same end-state. I argue that the so-called founders studied other systems so that they could create a system that favored them, but had the veneer of a democracy. All this was deliberate and in my opinion, that is what the history shows.
Just consider the phrase that they have been bashing us over the heads with ever since they wrote the rag we are governed under- that they sought to avoid “tyranny of the majority over the minority”- FFS- if you blatantly say that is what you seek to avoid, then what are you creating instead? Tyranny over the majority by the minority! We are so damned brainwashed and pathetic, it is embarrassing.
That same 1787 Constitutional Convention is the source of each State having equally two Senators, no matter their population. (Senators were appointed to their seats; were not elected until 1912.) These same Senators are given ‘advise and consent’ powers over Executive cabinet members AND the Supreme Court justices. So, the minority controls the majority, thank you.
I think the challenge is at a fundamental level: we haven’t had a lot of real “treaties” since WW2. Most of them were “agreements” signed by various presidents with other countries without bothering to ask for ratification. How many of them are really binding, then? Can every one of them be challenged in courts? At the abstract level, yes, I think so. If that is the case, pretty much the entirety of post WW2 US foreign policy stands on thin ice.
As a practical matter, it (probably) won’t go that far, if the judges have ang understanding of how modern US government works (but do they?) In some sense, the tariff stuff was really no more than just a more aggressive application of presidential power in foreign policy context (and not that much more aggressive–we have fought multiple wars without any constitutionally mandated authority, after all, among other things). Even if judges are really that ignorant, it could and would be just be “Cherokee Nation”ed.
It’s remarkable when you think about it. Trump has lived his whole life in the US and is supposed to be a pretty smart guy but it looks like that there is a lot about how the country is actually run that he does not understand. Like how he declared a full-blown trade war against China but then the bond traders had to clear their throats very loudly to make him back off. But now he is also challenging the actual legal system of the US and fighting the legal firms, the judges and also the courts. Individual lawyers and judges may differ in their beliefs but one thing that unites them all is not to have some jack a** trying to push them aside and rule by fiat. He has attacked judges personally that rule against him and questioned their authority. And when here the federal Court of International Trade ruled against him, he filed a notice of appeal and then in Trump-fashion questioned the authority of the court. He is not making many friends in the judicial system and no matter how many of them are Repub supporters, they will not tolerate a President seeking to make the judicial system subordinate to the office of the President.
>Trump has lived his whole life in the US and is supposed to be a pretty smart guy but it looks like that there is a lot about how the country is actually run that he does not understand.
Indeed, for his entire life the US has been on an uptrend and pretty much king of the world, a country able to shove most anyone around that we desire. Now that we as a nation are being eclipsed by others that are in ascendancy, I don’t think Trump, or any of the “elites” or TPTB know how to handle it.
As far as that “Mission from God ” stuff, I can’t track it down at the moment but I believe Trump mentioned in numerous speeches after that assassination attempt in Butler, Pa., that he believes he was saved by a higher authority for a purpose to save the US. So now we have that as a problem too.
Randall F: I don’t think Trump, or any of the “elites” or TPTB know how to handle it.
Oh, they’re clearly unable to even comprehend or imagine it, I’d say. So in that sense you understate their problem.
Of that I have no doubt.
And here I was taking the “Mission from God” business as a Blues Brothers allusion! Trump needs to bring Dan Aykroyd into the administration. Ambassador to the 51st state, maybe?
I doubt this will be a well received opinion but you have to consider the education he received from his own life experience. One of his earliest mentors and lawyers was one Roy Cohn. A notorious piece of work (until he was ultimately and finally disbarred in 1986). Trump’s approach to judges and law is entirely consistent with Cohn’s, I’d expect. You can make a reasonable presumption that he never learned any better, partly because it simply wasn’t necessary. He continued to rip off suppliers, employees, and even investors without much consequence for most of his career.
It’s worth associating them together, they probably shared a lot of worldview.
I see what you mean-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roy_Cohn
I think that I have to go for a shower now.
From a review of the autobiography of lefty lawyer Victor Rabinowitz:
“At the height of these strange proceedings, fate required that poor Victor have upclose and personal dealings with Joe McCarthy and Roy Cohn (prosecutor of the Rosenbergs and Chief Counsel to McCarthy’s committee). He gives a nuanced view of McCarthy as cruel in his role but “off camera” a “not unpleasant man, a good-natured drunk.” But he is far too lenient in regard to Cohn. His description (“Of all the evil men I’ve encountered in six decades of law practice…the most vicious”) errs in its excess of charity. Cohn, who died of AIDS in 1986 after years of knowingly infecting the unwitting boys he paid to sodomize him, was a locus of loathsome disease. I don’t mean AIDS, having AIDS was the healthiest thing about Roy Cohn in his entire adult life.”
I mistyped “rot cohn” into my search bar but it worked fine.
Wonder if Trump’s inner monologue regrets not listening to Roy’s “shoulder ghost” during his first term. (Roy would not have liked 2020 Fauci, Birx)
hence Trump’s “March to the Sea” in DC-land during his second term
In the same vein, one might ask where the judges have been living since WW2.
Whether it is constitutional or not (it’s not, really), most of US foreign policy since WW2 involved presidents acting unilaterally without bothering to ask Congress. Very few “treaties,” no declarations of war. Why not tariffs? It’s just continuation along the same spectrum. Perhaps it needs to be challenged and that has to start somewhere, but if so as a matter of pribciple and not just picking fights specifically with Trump (which has its own very serious issues), we’d be looking at a very serious and fundamental challenge to how US conducts foreign policy today.
This being the case, and it seems fairly clear, why was there so little congressional opposition on the theft of their authority and the illegal taxation? If the illegality was this clear, why wasn’t that their constant refrain?
I suggest you read the opinion. Congress double plus quick wrote new law when Nixon got a win on tariffs they did not expect so as to restrict his tariffs authority. Congress can’t have a go at a President except via impeachment. This sort of thing has to go through courts.
Which 4th century Roman Emperor is Trump?
Trick question: it doesn’t matter. Same going back several predecessors.
and the closest thing to Marcus Aurelius that we had was Nixon, lol!
Don’t do Diocletian dirty like that.
…would Benedict Donald be a Lamé Duck?
LMAO!!!
If as the title asks, Trump and uniTrumpism have peaked, what will the guiding lights of the Democratic Party do to capitalize on this?
My inbox provides a clue from Vice President Harris. She’s lowered her ask! Now it’s just $5 for her Fight Fund. It’s getting cheaper to buy politicians maybe some mere millionaires can join the club.
They probably see this as vindication that their plan (such as it is) to stand back and do nothing was obviously a winner and will double down on it.
An NYT story reposted by the Seattle Times reports that the acronym TACO – Trump Always Chickens Out – is gaining currency. From the report:
to quote the internet hive: the “Left” (Team 8647) does not know how to meme (mock).
paging the ghost of george Carlin; the world needs to see the art of creative ridicule
That explains that new dive at 1600 pennsylvania avenue, TACO-HELL.
https://warnerbros.fandom.com/wiki/The_Draft_Horse
“Don’t you know you can’t do that?” Horse then falls from hovering four legs splayed in the air.
May I be first to congratulate Potus orange haggis with a hearty, bwaa hah hah!
Does anyone hold out hope of finding an “originalist” court to take up unilateral sanctions or war powers?
The tantrum Trump threw when he learned about this ruling must have been epic, he seems to be losing it already and he may go completely off the rails publicly any day now.
Which would be equally amusing and terrifying.
Anybody see the movie Civil War that came out a year ago?
Who knows if life follows art, but if it looks like a Baedeker and talks like a lame duck with nothing to lose-the Presidency in particular, shift happens.
So since the tariffs were collected illegally can the government be sued to recoup them?
Not until this is fully adjudicated, but tariffs are a tax, and when the government loses a tax case, it must pay refunds…with interest.
Taco Bell is now running ads that it is also a chicken place, not just a taco place.
My running joke when I see a Taco Bell is to say Man, I need me some TB!
The court decision that the tariffs are illegal affected me directly. I made a $350 purchase of German goods online. Yesterday the goods cleared Customs and the tariffs added $250 to the bill. UPS delivery says to pay the driver directly. Fat Chance!
My best recourse is to Return to Sender and hope I can get a refund from the seller. The shipping costs, ~$40 each way, I’ll have to eat.
There is no way the $250 tariff costs will be returned in a timely fashion.
But they will owe you interest when they do!!!
It’s hard to overstate what a reversal this will be of the last two decades of US machinations in Ukraine. Biden in particular seemed to have a fixation on using the country as a weapon against Russia and looting it for resources. Recall Obama put Biden in charge of Ukraine related matters during Obama’s term; this project was interrupted briefly by Trump 1.0, then came back harder than ever when Biden entered the White House. The result has been hundreds of thousands of needless deaths and mutilations.
If the US does in fact ‘wash its hands” of Ukraine going forward, even this Trump failure will be a huge win for people around the world and a gigantic reversal for the neocon project. Hopefully the various geriatric cold warriors will age out in the next decade and we can move on to addressing the serious issues we face.
More likely the serious issues our oligarchs face, not least that none of them have enough money.
The All-Powerful, Neo-Slave Traders. and their supporting troupe of financial, political, military and dis-information actors, are are beside themselves with panic…………!
Lincoln’s well-considered political economy (the ‘American System’) trumped the Free Trade British System
March 2019Cambridge Journal of Economics 43(6):1-20
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332545152_Lincoln's_well-considered_political_economy_the_'American_System'_trumped_the_Free_Trade_British_System
“Abstract
The Whigs could legitimately emphasise what Hamilton’s Report had not touched upon: urban labourers made unemployed by import competition could not shift to ‘collateral employments’ with the presumptive ease asserted by Free Trader Democrats. More than anything, it was the structural cyclical instability (Minsky moments) that engendered a new party (Republican) to exert political pressures for government involvement in the management of the economy (mercantilism). Economic beliefs played the most fundamental role in Lincoln’s career, and his mercantilist views, in conformity with Hamilton, Clay and the economist Carey, were key determinants in effectuating the Industrial Revolution within the United States through tariffs, government-supported macro-projects and structurally stimulating aggregate demand through a national currency. Permeating Lincoln’s political economy was a fierce non-neutral view of money wherein banks created the funds to ignite the American System. Henry Clay, Henry Carey and Abraham Lincoln were seeking to supplant the Ricardo-Malthus long-term model of economic growth (emphasising distribution within a relatively stagnant economy) with one of expanding productive powers and rising wage levels. These interventionist issues are still quite relevant since US economics students are taught modernised versions of the doctrines of Ricardo and Malthus which were controverted more than a century ago by the American School, and more specifically by Abraham Lincoln.”
Now looks like a federal appeals court has not reversed it. Whiplash…
I dunno. T killed the TPP and the TPIP, truly awful ‘trade deals’ in his first term. And, imo, a big reason he beat Hills in 2016. Nobody outside of the Dem (and GOP) estab wanted those trade deals to go through. So I’m gonna cut him some slack here. So sue me.heh. / ;)
adding: to a comment still in mod, “trade court”? really? That’s exactly what people voted against in 2016 and, I think, in 2024. Not exactly the ISDS (Investor State Dispute Settlement) Court. But not far off from that either. See also the old Chevron decision, recently overturned I think.