A federal court on Wednesday blocked many of President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariff executive orders, saying the president overstepped his use of emergency powers to enact them.
The United States Court of International Trade issued an injunction for tariffs on Canada, China and Mexico, and a 10% global tariff plus additional reciprocal tariffs. The decision called for the government to stop any operations related to those tariff orders, and to issue administrative notices on the permanent injunction within 10 days.
The decision stands to provide some relief to the food industry, which previously expressed concern that tariffs could hike prices of scarce ingredients like chocolate and coffee. Tariffs stood to raise prices at a time when consumers are already sensitive to inflation and have cut back on spending.
The injunction came as the result of several legal cases wherein a few small businesses and several U.S. states filed separate but similar petitions to halt the tariffs, arguing their imposition via the International Emergency Economic Powers Act overstepped presidential powers. Lawyers representing the Trump administration quickly appealed the decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, D.C., and have 14 days to file additional documents supporting their case.
Trump had adopted a novel interpretation of the 1977 emergency trade law, which primarily concerns sanctions and embargoes. In its opinion, the court said the law does not “confer such unbounded authority” to impose “unlimited tariffs on goods from nearly every country in the world.”
Beyond broad tariffs on trading partners, Trump also used the IEEPA as the basis to eliminate the de minimis exemption for imports from China and Hong Kong. The White House plans to end de minimis treatment for other countries' products under the act, once systems are in place to collect the additional duties. Those changes are now in question, too, as a result of the court's decision to halt the executive orders that enabled them.
Tariffs on automobiles, auto parts, steel and aluminum products were not affected by the injunction, as they were implemented under a different trade authority: Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act. Similarly, any tariffs implemented under Section 301 will remain in place.
The U.S. Court of International Trade was established by the Constitution and has nationwide jurisdiction over civil actions arising out of customs and trade laws in the country, according to the court’s website. A federal appeals court can review its decisions.
Several Trump administration officials put out statements criticizing the courts’ action to halt tariffs. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, for example, said on X: “The judicial coup is out of control.”
In a statement posted on X, White House spokesperson Kush Desai said: “It is not for unelected judges to decide how to properly address a national emergency.”
Sarah Zimmerman and Max Garland contributed to this story.
Source link
