May 29, 2025

The Headlines Are Evil, And They’re Bringing Us Downwhat the court actually said about Trump’s tariffs

The United States Court of Trade, a specialized federal court based in New York City, recently ruled in a challenge to Donald Trump’s tariffs. Here were a couple of headlines covering it:

Based on whatever you’ve gathered about the decision up to now, do you see any problem with these headlines?

Compare these others:

Or these:

AP: “Federal court blocks Trump from imposing sweeping tariffs under emergency powers law”
The Hill: “Court of International Trade blocks Trump’s tariffs in sweeping ruling”

Ugh

The first group of headlines beg to mislead. They can be read two ways: one accurate, the other broader, more dramatic, more exciting, inflammatory, and wrong.

The court did not rule that the president can’t impose tariffs full stop, or that the president always has to act with the legislature to impose them. It did rule that the president can’t impose the particular tariffs the Trump admin announced and got sued for.

I’d call the first group of headlines clickbait. I’d also call them lawyerly, in the worst possible way. They’re playing tricky word games, with distinctions that matter, to influence conclusions. They are scratching at semantics to sow confusion, in this case to maximize drama.

Trump, as president, does have some power to set tariffs. The court’s decision says he does. “Court says Trump doesn’t have the authority to set tariffs” is wrong. It’s just fallback-defensible, by arguing that “tariffs” could have meant “recently announced tariffs” or “the tariffs the court was reviewing”. Not “tariffs generally”.

There are some procedural requirements for tariffs the president can impose. But for some purposes, the president can impose tariffs without prior approval by Congress. Those would be fair to call “unilateral”, in the sense of the executive branch acting alone, without the courts or the legislature. “Federal court says Trump doesn’t have the power to impose tariffs unilaterally” is wrong. It’s just fallback-defensible, by the same kind of dissembling.

The court’s decision covers all of this.

The Decision in Brief

The court breaks down the tariffs into two groups, “trafficking tariffs” announced in executive orders and declarations giving drug trafficking as primary motivation, and “worldwide and retaliatory tariffs” citing concerns about unfair trade, tariffs, and economic policies worldwide.

The basic law is that the Constitution gives the power to regulate foreign trade to Congress, not the president, under article I, section 8, clauses 1 and 3:

Constitution article I, section 8

The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

…

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;

Congress can’t give this power over from the legislature to the executive just by passing a normal law. That would take a constitutional amendment. But it can pass laws to delegate part of its power to the president in limited ways.

The administration pointed to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 as the law giving it delegated power to set the new tariffs. The court goes through the history of that law and changes made to it. It also mentions the National Emergencies Act, which sets up the process for declaring national emergencies referred to in the Powers Act.

The court struck down the “worldwide and retaliatory” tariffs because they’re so broad. The court couldn’t read the part of the International Emergency Powers Act delegating power to the president to impose unbounded tariffs. It couldn’t read the law that way because doing so would violate the rules about how Congress can delegate the powers the Constitution say belong specifically to it. The first of those rules, called the “nondelegation doctrine”, requires Congress to specify an “intelligible principle” according to which the power has to be exercised, passing a law that “meaningfully constrains” the president’s delegated power. Delegation has to be limited. Unlimited tariffs can’t fit under a limited power.

The court struck down the “trafficking” tariffs because the International Emergency Economic Powers Act requires that the president’s actions address the declared national emergency they’re based on. It found no reasoning in the orders imposing the “trafficking” tariffs showing how they address trafficking. It rejected the idea that using tariffs to create diplomatic pressure or negotiating leverage alone could count, since that would justify nearly anything, making the law’s requirement irrelevant.

International Emergency Economic Powers Act §202.4

Any authority granted to the President by section 203 may be exercised to deal with any unusual and extraordinary threat, which has its source in whole or substantial part outside the United States, to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States, if the President declares a national emergency with respect to such threat.

The authorities granted to the President by section 203 may only be exercised to deal with an unusual and extraordinary threat with respect to which a national emergency has been declared for purposes of this title and may not be exercised for any other purpose. Any exercise of such authorities to deal with any new threat shall be based on a new declaration of national emergency which must be with respect to such threat.

The most important older legal decisions the court points to were in cases brought by a company called Yoshida International against broad tariffs imposed by the Nixon administration. The first of those decisions led Congress to change the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, adding more limits on what the president could do. The second actually upheld Nixon’s tariffs under the revised law, but strongly emphasized that the law has limits and the tariffs were legal because they were limited.

Lawyers would say the court distinguished this case, about Trump’s tariffs, from the Yoshida case, about Nixon’s. The rule remains that presidents can impose tariffs within the limits of the law Congress passed. Nixon’s tariffs came under those limits, so they were legal. Trump’s tariffs didn’t, so they’re not.

The Trump administration has already appealed this decision. Normally, that would mean the case goes first to the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and any appeals up from there to the Supreme Court.

Coda

The same Axios story headlined “Court says Trump doesn’t have the authority to set tariffs” also runs with the headline “Trump’s tariffs blocked by federal trade court”. I’ve got search results pages from DuckDuckGo showing two links to that same article, one in a media box with the “spicy” headline, another as text link with the other.

Which do you suppose will win the A/B click-off?

Your thoughts and feedback are always welcome by e-mail.