Kochi: In a blow to the US President’s tariff war, a US court has ruled that most tariffs issued by Trump are illegal, BBC reported.
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said the move will set up a potential legal showdown that could upend Trump’s foreign policy agenda.
Calling them “invalid as contrary to law”, the court in a 7-4 decision verdict, rejected Trump’s argument that the tariffs were permitted under an emergency economic powers act.
The ruling will not take effect until 14 October to give the administration time to move the Supreme Court on the matter. Trump said on his Social media platform Truth Social: “If allowed to stand, this Decision would literally destroy the United States of America.”
“Today a Highly Partisan Appeals Court incorrectly said that our Tariffs should be removed, but they know the United States of America will win in the end,” he wrote.
Trump had justified the tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), which gives the president the power to act against “unusual and extraordinary” threats.
Trump has declared a national emergency on trade, arguing that a trade imbalance is harmful to US national security.
The 127-page ruling says that the IEEPA “neither mentions tariffs (or any of its synonyms) nor has procedural safeguards that contain clear limits on the President’s power to impose tariffs”.
The power to impose taxes and tariffs therefore continues to belong to Congress, the court ruled, and the IEEPA does not override this.
The ruling comes in response to two lawsuits filed by small businesses and a coalition of US states.
The lawsuits were filed after Trump’s executive orders in April, which imposed a baseline 10% tariff on almost every country in the world, as well as “reciprocal” tariffs on dozens of countries.
However, the decision does not apply to other tariffs, like those imposed on steel and aluminium, which were brought in under a different presidential authority.
Ahead of the ruling, lawyers for the White House argued that invalidating the tariffs would lead to a 1929-style financial collapse, a stock market crash which led to the Great Depression, the reports said.
