Trump Wins Tariff Reprieve as Trade Agenda Faces Rollback
A federal appeals court has granted President Trump a temporary reprieve from a ruling that threatened his tariff agenda, providing hope amid new restrictions on trade efforts. Trump criticized the original decision as political and harmful to presidential power, urging the Supreme Court to reverse it. Despite the stay, concerns remain that the appeals court may ultimately uphold the original ruling. The White House plans to defend its trade policies in court, asserting that judicial interference could undermine diplomatic negotiations.
(Bloomberg) -- A federal appeals court offered President Donald Trump a temporary reprieve from a ruling threatening to throw out the bulk of his sweeping tariff agenda, offering at least some hope to a White House now facing substantial new restrictions on its effort to rewrite the global trading order.
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The administration celebrated the order from the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit as validating its vow to aggressively challenge a ruling issued Wednesday night by the Court of International Trade blocking sweeping parts of Trump’s tariffs over his use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA.
Trump hailed the appeals court ruling in a social media post on Thursday night, while calling the original decision “so wrong and so political!” He claimed that seeking congressional approval for tariffs would hinder his trade agenda and “completely destroy Presidential Power.”
“Hopefully, the Supreme Court will reverse this horrible, Country threatening decision, QUICKLY and DECISIVELY,” Trump said in the post.
Despite the temporary stay, the possibility that the appeals court could ultimately back the original ruling and block Trump’s tariff policy hung heavy over the White House. Separately, a second federal judge declared a number of Trump’s levies enacted using emergency powers unlawful, but limited his decision to the family-owned business that sued and delayed the order from taking effect for 14 days to allow the Justice Department time to appeal.
White House officials said they planned to continue defending the legality of their efforts on trade to the US Supreme Court, and said that if they were stymied, Trump would simply pursue the same levies through other authorities.
“America cannot function if President Trump — or any other president, for that matter — has their sensitive diplomatic or trade negotiations railroaded by activist judges,” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Thursday. “Ultimately, the Supreme Court must put an end to this for the sake of our Constitution and our country.”
The original court ruling would have provided the administration just 10 days to unwind the levies. But the new order laid out a briefing schedule that runs through June 9 to decide on the request for a longer-term stay. If granted — or if a subsequent appeal to the Supreme Court was granted — the tariffs could remain in place for months.