August 29, 2025
In a huge defeat for President Trump the DC appeals court says he does not have the legal authority or power to impose his sweeping tariffs or those so called “reciprocal tariffs”.
That major ruling just came down a short time ago but that doesn’t’ mean the tariffs are disappearing immediately. Before I explain why – you need to know the president has already blasted this ruling in a lengthy post on his social media account. Of course he said this was a partisan group of judges – even though the most senior judge in the majority opinion was appointed by President George HW Bush. In his post Trump said “if these tariffs ever went away, it would be a total disaster for the country. It would make us financially weak, and we have to be strong.” He then went on to say he’s absolutely appealing this ruling to the US Supreme Court, and he almost guarantees that the justices are going to give him what he wants. “now, with the help of the United States supreme court, we will use them to the benefit of our nation, and make America rich, strong, and powerful again!” We will have to wait and see if the supreme court actually agrees with him. But in the meantime – this DC Appeals court injunction will stand. However the judges said the tariffs will be allowed to remain in effect allowing trump time to appeal to the supreme court.
The case is being brought by US importers and 12 states including Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Minnesota, Nevada New Mexico, New York, Oregon and Vermont. They argued that Trump’s tariffs actions are hurting them financially by increasing their costs and disrupting their operations and they say Trump does not have the legal or constitutional power to just willy nilly impose tariffs at whatever rate he wants on the entire world for as long as he wants. See – trump believes there is a “national emergency” and an “unusual and extraordinary threat” when it comes to the trade deficits and fentanyl and because of those emergencies he believes he has every right to impose whatever tariff rate he wants without the consent of congress. To justify this he’s using a law from the 1970s called the international emergency economic powers act.
Well today in a seven to four ruling, the appeals judges said no. Trump does not have that power under the IEEPA law. They said the law gives the president the power to “regulate importation” during a national emergency, but the law does not include the word “tariff” once. The judges said the law does not authorize the president to impose tariffs, duties or taxes. They said the constitution is clear. Those powers belong to congress.
“Our decision today preserves the constitutional allocation of authority: tariffs are taxes, and the power to tax lies with congress. Presidents may not claim by implication what the constitution entrusts expressly to the legislature.”
I will let you know if or when the supreme court decides to take this up.]
Read the ruling here.
Read the statement from the plaintiffs here.
Read President Trump’s comment here.
