Donald Trump is losing all his bluster on tariffs. Trump can no longer bully foreign countries after the Supreme Court struck down his emergency reciprocal tariffs. Republicans and the White House complained that Trump “lost his leverage” when the court ruled that no president can make amends and unilaterally impose tariffs.
CNN’s Aaron Blake explained that Trump could collapse his entire house of cards if he continues to try to use Section 122:
And his stated alternative of setting a 15% global tariff under some other authority could easily fail – bringing down his entire tariff system.
That’s because the law he now relies on, section 122(a) of the Commerce Act 1974, was intended to address different situations. It is not intended for trade deficits, which the Trump administration has cited as justification for the president’s now-removed emergency tariffs, but rather for a serious balance of payments deficit.
The problem is that the Trump administration has already argued that Section 122 does not apply to trade deficits, which is why the president had to use an emergency to impose his own tariffs. The 122 tariffs are not unilateral and must be extended by Congress, but Senate Democrats immediately slammed the door on that possibility.
Read more below.
