The court ruled that Congress has the authority to regulate foreign commerce under the Constitution.
The U.S. Court of International Trade ruled on Wednesday that President Donald Trump’s wide-ranging, Liberation Day” reciprocal tariffs, which were made under emergency authority based on the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act, overstepped executive branch authority. The court determined that Congress alone has the authority to regulate commerce with foreign countries under the Constitution.
“The question in the two cases before the court is whether the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (‘IEEPA’) delegates these powers to the President in the form of authority to impose unlimited tariffs on goods from nearly every country in the world,” the court wrote. “The court does not read IEEPA to confer such unbounded authority and sets aside the challenged tariffs imposed thereunder.”
“Because of the Constitution’s express allocation of the tariff power to Congress… we do not read IEEPA to delegate an unbounded tariff authority to the President. We instead read IEEPA’s provisions to impose meaningful limits on any such authority it confers,” the panel wrote. “The Worldwide and Retaliatory Tariffs lack any identifiable limits.”
The judges ruled, “The challenged Tariff Orders will be vacated and their operation permanently enjoined.”
As the Lord Leads, Pray with Us…
- For President Trump and his trade team as they seek to update agreements with foreign trading partners.
- For discernment for federal judges as they hear and rule on lawsuits regarding the separation of powers of the three branches of government.
Sources: Daily Wire, Townhall, Politico
