Kavanaugh rips Supreme Court majority's ‘illogical’ line on tariffs
This looks less like justice and more like strategy.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh called the Supreme Court’s decision striking down Trump’s emergency tariffs "illogical" in a fiery dissent on Friday and offered a roadmap of alternatives Trump could use to attempt to carry out his signature economic policy.
Kavanaugh, a Trump appointee, said the 6-3 majority cherry-picked ways in which Trump could regulate imports under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, making what he said was a textualist case that the law already allows similar forms of regulation on imports, including quotas and embargoes. Tariffs are not just in the same category as those but are a "far more modest" alternative to them, Kavanaugh said.
"If quotas and embargoes are a means to regulate importation, how are tariffs not a means to regulate importation? Nothing in the text supports such an illogical distinction," Kavanaugh wrote.
Trump last year bypassed Congress and unilaterally levied tariffs on nearly every country in the world by invoking IEEPA. The president argued that an influx of illicit drugs from China, Mexico and Canada and a trade deficit that has decimated American manufacturing constituted emergencies that justified the tariffs.
SUPREME COURT BLOCKS TRUMP'S TARIFFS IN MAJOR TEST OF EXECUTIVE POWER
The majority held in a 6-3 opinion that while IEEPA allows a president to "regulate importation" during a declared national emergency, the statute does not clearly authorize tariffs — a core congressional taxing power. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that when executive action carries sweeping economic consequences, Congress must weigh in on the matter with unmistakable clarity, alluding to what is known as the major questions doctrine.
Kavanaugh said the Supreme Court's decision in 2022 upholding a vaccine mandate former President Joe Biden imposed on millions of healthcare workers "strongly supports" upholding Trump's tariffs. Like tariffs, that executive action also carried major consequences even though Congress did not explicitly mention vaccines in the health and safety statute Biden used to justify his mandate.
In oral arguments in November, Solicitor General John Sauer, appearing on behalf of the government, said tariffs were an invaluable way for Trump to negotiate with foreign partners. Weakening his "suite of tools" by removing tariffs from it was a "bit unusual," Sauer said.
Sauer also said tariffs were the same as embargoes, which block imports altogether. The solicitor general conceded, though, that tariffs had the "incidental and collateral effect" of raising revenue, but he said their primary purpose was …
This looks less like justice and more like strategy.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh called the Supreme Court’s decision striking down Trump’s emergency tariffs "illogical" in a fiery dissent on Friday and offered a roadmap of alternatives Trump could use to attempt to carry out his signature economic policy.
Kavanaugh, a Trump appointee, said the 6-3 majority cherry-picked ways in which Trump could regulate imports under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, making what he said was a textualist case that the law already allows similar forms of regulation on imports, including quotas and embargoes. Tariffs are not just in the same category as those but are a "far more modest" alternative to them, Kavanaugh said.
"If quotas and embargoes are a means to regulate importation, how are tariffs not a means to regulate importation? Nothing in the text supports such an illogical distinction," Kavanaugh wrote.
Trump last year bypassed Congress and unilaterally levied tariffs on nearly every country in the world by invoking IEEPA. The president argued that an influx of illicit drugs from China, Mexico and Canada and a trade deficit that has decimated American manufacturing constituted emergencies that justified the tariffs.
SUPREME COURT BLOCKS TRUMP'S TARIFFS IN MAJOR TEST OF EXECUTIVE POWER
The majority held in a 6-3 opinion that while IEEPA allows a president to "regulate importation" during a declared national emergency, the statute does not clearly authorize tariffs — a core congressional taxing power. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that when executive action carries sweeping economic consequences, Congress must weigh in on the matter with unmistakable clarity, alluding to what is known as the major questions doctrine.
Kavanaugh said the Supreme Court's decision in 2022 upholding a vaccine mandate former President Joe Biden imposed on millions of healthcare workers "strongly supports" upholding Trump's tariffs. Like tariffs, that executive action also carried major consequences even though Congress did not explicitly mention vaccines in the health and safety statute Biden used to justify his mandate.
In oral arguments in November, Solicitor General John Sauer, appearing on behalf of the government, said tariffs were an invaluable way for Trump to negotiate with foreign partners. Weakening his "suite of tools" by removing tariffs from it was a "bit unusual," Sauer said.
Sauer also said tariffs were the same as embargoes, which block imports altogether. The solicitor general conceded, though, that tariffs had the "incidental and collateral effect" of raising revenue, but he said their primary purpose was …
Kavanaugh rips Supreme Court majority's ‘illogical’ line on tariffs
This looks less like justice and more like strategy.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh called the Supreme Court’s decision striking down Trump’s emergency tariffs "illogical" in a fiery dissent on Friday and offered a roadmap of alternatives Trump could use to attempt to carry out his signature economic policy.
Kavanaugh, a Trump appointee, said the 6-3 majority cherry-picked ways in which Trump could regulate imports under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, making what he said was a textualist case that the law already allows similar forms of regulation on imports, including quotas and embargoes. Tariffs are not just in the same category as those but are a "far more modest" alternative to them, Kavanaugh said.
"If quotas and embargoes are a means to regulate importation, how are tariffs not a means to regulate importation? Nothing in the text supports such an illogical distinction," Kavanaugh wrote.
Trump last year bypassed Congress and unilaterally levied tariffs on nearly every country in the world by invoking IEEPA. The president argued that an influx of illicit drugs from China, Mexico and Canada and a trade deficit that has decimated American manufacturing constituted emergencies that justified the tariffs.
SUPREME COURT BLOCKS TRUMP'S TARIFFS IN MAJOR TEST OF EXECUTIVE POWER
The majority held in a 6-3 opinion that while IEEPA allows a president to "regulate importation" during a declared national emergency, the statute does not clearly authorize tariffs — a core congressional taxing power. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that when executive action carries sweeping economic consequences, Congress must weigh in on the matter with unmistakable clarity, alluding to what is known as the major questions doctrine.
Kavanaugh said the Supreme Court's decision in 2022 upholding a vaccine mandate former President Joe Biden imposed on millions of healthcare workers "strongly supports" upholding Trump's tariffs. Like tariffs, that executive action also carried major consequences even though Congress did not explicitly mention vaccines in the health and safety statute Biden used to justify his mandate.
In oral arguments in November, Solicitor General John Sauer, appearing on behalf of the government, said tariffs were an invaluable way for Trump to negotiate with foreign partners. Weakening his "suite of tools" by removing tariffs from it was a "bit unusual," Sauer said.
Sauer also said tariffs were the same as embargoes, which block imports altogether. The solicitor general conceded, though, that tariffs had the "incidental and collateral effect" of raising revenue, but he said their primary purpose was …
