President Donald Trump just received news about a big win from the Supreme Court on a key tariff case. The industry group sued to stop President Trump’s tariffs saying that he was overreaching.
They claimed that it was Congress’ job and while under the constitution they are correct, Congress has ceded some authority to the executive in this front.
Reuters reported that this Monday the U.S. Supreme Court turned away a challenge to President Trump’s tariffs on imported steel brought by an industry group that argued that a key part of the law under which he imposed the duties violates the Constitution.
The justices declined to hear the American Institute for International Steel’s appeal of a March ruling by the U.S. Court of International Trade that rejected the group’s lawsuit. The institute is a pro-free trade group that represents steel importers and users of imported steel.
The President imposed 25% tariffs on imported steel and 10% tariffs on imported aluminum in March last year based on national security grounds. Exemptions have been granted to Argentina, Australia, Brazil and South Korea in exchange for quotas. Canada and Mexico were exempted in May. In response, both countries lifted their retaliatory tariffs on our country.
The institute brought its lawsuit in June 2018, while arguing that a section of the 1962 Trade Expansion Act, which allows U.S. presidents to impose tariffs based on national security, is unconstitutional because it delegates too much discretion to the president at the expense of Congress.
Fox Business reported that the decision, which the justices didn’t immediately comment, will leave in place the U.S. Court of International Trade’s ruling from March that allowed President Trump’s tariffs.
In March last year, President Trump imposed 25% tariffs on imported steel and 10% on imported aluminum. A group of companies in the steel industry, including the American Institute for International Steel (AIIS), then filed a lawsuit to argue that the tariffs had violated the U.S. Constitution because section 232 was an “improper delegation of legislative authority and violates the principles of separation of powers and checks and balances established by the Constitution.”
The steel importers said that President Trump doesn’t have unbounded authority under the Constitution to regulate trade — and argued the job belongs to Congress.
