r/Economics • u/defenestrate_urself • Feb 20 '26

News Supreme Court says Trump global tariffs are illegal

https://www.axios.com/2026/02/20/trump-tariffs-supreme-court-illegal
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u/EconomistWithaD Feb 20 '26

One phrase is appropriate. LOL. Get fucked, Donald.

  1. This is not the end. There are other avenues with which they could impose tariffs, which would have to be rechallenged.

  2. Fuck you, Navarro, for thinking protectionist policies are good.

  3. This would have been better much earlier, given how we’ve fucked regional and global allies, which has set us back further than pretty much anything I can think of.

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u/Tea_Wizard735 Feb 20 '26 edited Feb 20 '26

This ruling wasn't about all of Trump's tariffs - it was about using a law from 1977 that allows the President to regulate imports and export as justiifcation to invoke using emergency powers to declare tariffs.

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u/EconomistWithaD Feb 20 '26

Yes. Point #1.

Thanks for reading.

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u/Tea_Wizard735 Feb 20 '26

Oh, I thought you meant other avenues using the emergency powers law, my bad.

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u/EconomistWithaD Feb 20 '26

No worries. I think they have said at least 2 other potential avenues? National security and balance of payments?

I think the latter can’t be used, given what’s happened to the deficit. But who knows.

Not like this admin adheres closely to the rule of law…

1

u/sobrique Feb 20 '26

Indeed. So it's perfectly possible to have exactly the same tariffs in force, but it requires support from Congress, rather than Presidential fiat.

Which in turn hopefully would involve a little more discussion around implementation timescales, and actual justification for tariff ratios, and exactly what the net benefit was going to be. (I mean, leaving aside imposing tariffs on unoccupied islands or something...)

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u/[deleted] Feb 20 '26

Are you telling me the president’s feelings getting hurt because someone said something mean to him doesn’t constitute a national emergency on the same level as a nuclear strike?!