SCOTUS rules Trump's sweeping emergency tariffs are illegal

19,702 Views | 338 Replies | Last: 16 days ago by FIDO_Ags
infinity ag
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Now this was basically what Trump talked about most of the time. What happens next? Does he roll them back to ZERO? Many other countries are tariffing us, what about that?

I was reading some foreign press and they are all jubilant.

I think this will juice up the stock market SHORT TERM, but we are effect LONG TERM. But this has been our tragedy, we always think about the short term money grab which is why we have hollowed out the country.

Supreme Court rules that Trump's sweeping emergency tariffs are illegal
https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/20/politics/supreme-court-tariffs

Quote:

The Supreme Court on Friday ruled that President Donald Trump violated federal law when he unilaterally imposed sweeping tariffs across the globe, a striking loss for the White House on an issue that has been central to the president's foreign policy and economic agenda.

The decision is arguably the most important loss the second Trump administration has sustained at the conservative Supreme Court, which last year repeatedly sided with the president in a series of emergency rulings on immigration, the firing of the leaders of independent agencies and deep cuts to government spending.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion and the court agreed 6-3 that the tariffs exceeded the law. The court, however, did not say what should happen to the more than $130 billion in tariffs that has already been collected.
"The president asserts the extraordinary power to unilaterally impose tariffs of unlimited amount, duration, and scope," Roberts wrote for the court. "In light of the breadth, history, and constitutional context of that asserted authority, he must identify clear congressional authorization to exercise it."

The emergency authority Trump attempted to rely on, the court said, "falls short."

Justices Amy Coney Barrett and Neil Gorsuch joined with Roberts and the three liberal justices in the majority. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh dissented.

In his opinion, Roberts brushed aside an argument from the administration that the president had power to use tariffs to regulate commerce. That was an issue that came up during the oral arguments last year as Trump suggested the president had inherent authority to issue the tariffs.

"When Congress grants the power to impose tariffs, it does so clearly and with careful constraints," Roberts wrote. "It did neither here."

"We claim no special competence in matters of economics or foreign affairs," Roberts wrote. "We claim only, as we must, the limited role assigned to us by Article III of the Constitution. Fulfilling that role, we hold that IEEPA does not authorize the president to impose tariffs."

Tex100
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One of their reasons was trade imbalance has been around for 59 years. I would argue their cumulative effect has caused the emergency.
Im Gipper
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Not only is there already a thread, YOU POSTED in it!!

Our American hero CEOs would've never failed like this!

I'm Gipper
StandUpforAmerica
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Pinochet
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What will he do? The tariffs are illegal so they shouldn't exist. Why is that even a question? If he doesn't, he should be impeached. We would all say that a dem president should be impeached for doing illegal things too. If Joe Biden had decided to move forward with the student loan forgiveness that was struck down, would we have accepted that or do we all believe in the rule of law?

Will he direct CBP to pay the illegal tariffs collected back to the importers?
shiftyandquick
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Trump obviously acted illegally. He cited fentanyl at first, which was a bold-faced obvious lie.

He needs to follow the law when trying to ruin the economy through tariffs. He needs to go through Congress and get Congress to agree to ruin the economy.
flown-the-coop
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Pinochet said:

What will he do? The tariffs are illegal so they shouldn't exist. Why is that even a question? If he doesn't, he should be impeached. We would all say that a dem president should be impeached for doing illegal things too. If Joe Biden had decided to move forward with the student loan forgiveness that was struck down, would we have accepted that or do we all believe in the rule of law?

Will he direct CBP to pay the illegal tariffs collected back to the importers?

Some tariffs were ruled illegal, not all.

SCOTUS did not direct them to be repaid.
jt2hunt
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Lol congress doing something for the good of the country!
BoDog
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Once again A.C. Barrett disappoints. I bet Trump would like to have a do over on that nomination.
flown-the-coop
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shiftyandquick said:

Trump obviously acted illegally. He cited fentanyl at first, which was a bold-faced obvious lie.

He needs to follow the law when trying to ruin the economy through tariffs. He needs to go through Congress and get Congress to agree to ruin the economy.

T's and P's when you realize most tariffs will either continue or will be reworked under other authorities. And it still will not require repayments.
Ellis Wyatt
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She's terrible. You can be sure she'll rule against republicans on redistricting and birthright citizenship.
flown-the-coop
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BoDog said:

Once again A.C. Barrett disappoints. I bet Trump would like to have a do over on that nomination.

She appears unwilling to "compromise" on being crafty in reaching more optimum conclusions. That's probably a really good thing long term, even if it's frustrating.

Libs have no concept of this as their justices rarely rely on the US Constitution in determining their opinions and rulings.
caleblyn
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Is there a list of countries that agreed to tariffs and those that did not? Of those that did not, which were enforced by IEEPA? All?
Colonel Kurtz
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Lol, lmao even.
Sims
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Pinochet said:

What will he do? The tariffs are illegal so they shouldn't exist. Why is that even a question? If he doesn't, he should be impeached. We would all say that a dem president should be impeached for doing illegal things too. If Joe Biden had decided to move forward with the student loan forgiveness that was struck down, would we have accepted that or do we all believe in the rule of law?

Will he direct CBP to pay the illegal tariffs collected back to the importers?

Everyone here said American citizens paid the tariff. Trump was already talking about tariff dividend checks to the people from the IRS/Treasury. Two steps ahead, always.
Law-Apt_3G
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Need a 48hr rule on Bozo posting. Just remember the rich do not pay tariffs, I mean taxes.
GeorgiAg
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There are multiple ways to impose tariffs, and Trump will be able to get this done. He is, however, going to have other people review and sign off on it. This will hopefully allow cooler heads to prevail, and the huge benefit is that it will give businesses stability which will benefits the markets and all of us. I am all in favor of tariffs against countries with an unfair trade relationship for whatever reason.

Trump wanted full authoritarian power to just tweet out tariffs and execute them by executive order whenever he felt like it. It was dumb from the get-go.

"This country did something and made me mad!" is not an emergency. This was moronic.

You may retort that this is my TDS; however, if you think Trump should have this power, may I suggest that it is in fact you, that has TDS?
No Spin Ag
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Sims said:

Pinochet said:

What will he do? The tariffs are illegal so they shouldn't exist. Why is that even a question? If he doesn't, he should be impeached. We would all say that a dem president should be impeached for doing illegal things too. If Joe Biden had decided to move forward with the student loan forgiveness that was struck down, would we have accepted that or do we all believe in the rule of law?

Will he direct CBP to pay the illegal tariffs collected back to the importers?

Everyone here said American citizens paid the tariff. Trump was already talking about tariff dividend checks to the people from the IRS/Treasury. Two steps ahead, always.

Show. Me. The. Money.

If ever Trump was going to "Promises made. Promises Kept." now would be a great time.
There are in fact two things, science and opinion; the former begets knowledge, the later ignorance. Hippocrates
flown-the-coop
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Being direct and efficient and pushing limits is not moronic nor authoritarian. I know you may not believe that, but normal people understand it.
MouthBQ98
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Trump acted under an untested interpretation of the law. He didn't act in knowing and deliberate violation of it. Now that yhis interpretation has been rejected by scotus, going forward it will be considered to be unsupportable and unlawful.

The tariffs this applied to are invalidated and csnt be collected going forwards. I highly doubt they will be retroactively refunded.
MelvinUdall
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shiftyandquick said:

Trump obviously acted illegally. He cited fentanyl at first, which was a bold-faced obvious lie.

He needs to follow the law when trying to ruin the economy through tariffs. He needs to go through Congress and get Congress to agree to ruin the economy.


Considering it was only a portion of the tariffs, not all of them, so don't take your victory lap just yet, Reagan "conservative".
Kashchei
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Worst dictator ever!
No Spin Ag
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MouthBQ98 said:

Trump acted under an untested interpretation of the law. He didn't act in knowing and deliberate violation of it. Now that yhis interpretation has been rejected by scotus, going forward it will be considered to be unsupportable and unlawful.

The tariffs this applied to are invalidated and csnt be collected going forwards. I highly doubt they will be retroactively refunded.

The best thing about this term for Trump is that he is making it that much easier for every administration after him to impose their will because they will know fully what they can and can't do from day one.

It's long overdue for the presidential branch to test its limits.
There are in fact two things, science and opinion; the former begets knowledge, the later ignorance. Hippocrates
Ghost of Andrew Eaton
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MouthBQ98 said:

Trump acted under an untested interpretation of the law. He didn't act in knowing and deliberate violation of it. Now that yhis interpretation has been rejected by scotus, going forward it will be considered to be unsupportable and unlawful.

The tariffs this applied to are invalidated and csnt be collected going forwards. I highly doubt they will be retroactively refunded.

This is what I talk about with my students often. Checks and Balances aren't needed if nobody pushes the limits and then gets their hands slapped. And usually, they push the limits because they have good intentions, not that good intentions are enough.

As a layperson, this ruling looks to be reasonable. Now it's the President's turn to have a reasonable response to their ruling and follow it.
If you say you hate the state of politics in this nation and you don't get involved in it, you obviously don't hate the state of politics in this nation.
flown-the-coop
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Ghost of Andrew Eaton said:

MouthBQ98 said:

Trump acted under an untested interpretation of the law. He didn't act in knowing and deliberate violation of it. Now that yhis interpretation has been rejected by scotus, going forward it will be considered to be unsupportable and unlawful.

The tariffs this applied to are invalidated and csnt be collected going forwards. I highly doubt they will be retroactively refunded.

This is what I talk about with my students often. Checks and Balances aren't needed if nobody pushes the limits and then gets their hands slapped. And usually, they push the limits because they have good intentions, not that good intentions are enough.

As a layperson, this ruling looks to be reasonable. Now it's the President's turn to have a reasonable response to their ruling and follow it.

I would teach your students that there is no point in having limits if you do not test them, push things to the limit.

I think I see one of the issues with today's youth. Johnny, don't get too close to that flame it might cause your to warm up a bit and think for yourself.

Listen to me and what I tell you. Head down, follow the line, keep quiet.
Morbo the Annihilator
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If this is a runied economy I'll gladly take more runination.
4
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BoDog said:

Once again A.C. Barrett disappoints. I bet Trump would like to have a do over on that nomination.

She was an absolute waste of a SC appointment.

She's worthless.
Helicopter Ben
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shiftyandquick said:

Trump obviously acted illegally. He cited fentanyl at first, which was a bold-faced obvious lie.

He needs to follow the law when trying to ruin the economy through tariffs. He needs to go through Congress and get Congress to agree to ruin the economy.

That's probably the only thing congress can agree on. The one thing government is good at is destroying things. And in the process of destroying things they waste a ton of money doing it. So it's kind of a double whammy of destruction.
mm98
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Trying to digest all I can in the past hour. I'm in supply chain so this impacts me quite a bit.

Looks like IEEPA, Reciprocal, are affected.

232/301 are still in play?
HoustonAggie11
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Trump acted illegally?
javajaws
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mm98 said:

Trying to digest all I can in the past hour. I'm in supply chain so this impacts me quite a bit.

Looks like IEEPA, Reciprocal, are affected.

232/301 are still in play?

Yeah, that's the multi billion dollar question. WHICH exact tariffs will go away, and which remain. I don't know that there is a good list anywhere for this as of now.
Sims
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mm98 said:

Trying to digest all I can in the past hour. I'm in supply chain so this impacts me quite a bit.

Looks like IEEPA, Reciprocal, are affected.

232/301 are still in play?

Yes

If you're digesting for the purpose of getting money back, that's probably not happening unless you're the importer of record. If you're downstream, the IOR is probably going to hold off under the impression that the tariffs will just be reestablished under another mechanism. If your vendor just blended the tariffs into their prices, you're probably less likely to have an argument than if they delineated the tariffs amounts to a separate billable surcharge line.
BusterAg
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GeorgiAg said:

There are multiple ways to impose tariffs, and Trump will be able to get this done. He is, however, going to have other people review and sign off on it. This will hopefully allow cooler heads to prevail, and the huge benefit is that it will give businesses stability which will benefits the markets and all of us. I am all in favor of tariffs against countries with an unfair trade relationship for whatever reason.

Trump wanted full authoritarian power to just tweet out tariffs and execute them by executive order whenever he felt like it. It was dumb from the get-go.

"This country did something and made me mad!" is not an emergency. This was moronic.

You may retort that this is my TDS; however, if you think Trump should have this power, may I suggest that it is in fact you, that has TDS?

So, under the Trade Act, Trump has to appoint a trade representative to the target country that will agree to enact a Tariff.

Pretty sure that is not a very tall hill to climb.

Don't get me wrong, I am all about reducing executive power. The impact of this ruling on the rollback to executive power in the long run is going to be a greater impact than the short-term impact on tariffs.

It's going to be much harder to unearth a century old law and interpret it in a new way to support a new EO. That is good. Is a trick that Biden and Obama both employed, and Trump was able to get that shot down without any long-term harm.
mm98
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Sims said:

mm98 said:

Trying to digest all I can in the past hour. I'm in supply chain so this impacts me quite a bit.

Looks like IEEPA, Reciprocal, are affected.

232/301 are still in play?

Yes

If you're digesting for the purpose of getting money back, that's probably not happening unless you're the importer of record. If you're downstream, the IOR is probably going to hold off under the impression that the tariffs will just be reestablished under another mechanism. If your vendor just blended the tariffs into their prices, you're probably less likely to have an argument than if they delineated the tariffs amounts to a separate billable surcharge line.


Refunds at this point are not my immediate concern. Its the valued resell price of my inventory, which in my market, is commodity driven so the market reacts quick. Trying to figure out how many tens of thousands of SKUs I need to update.

We are not the IOR in most cases, so we'd be waiting on vendors to provide data, which will be delayed because they're waiting on the USCBP for refunds.
Iced-T14
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Always a fan of boxing in the executive branch
 
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