A US federal court on Wednesday blocked most of US President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs from going into effect, boosting markets yesterday even as the White House appealed against the decision by “unelected judges.”
Trump’s trade policies have roiled financial markets with planned import levies aimed at punishing economies that sell more to the US than they buy.
Trump said that the trade deficits and the threat posed by the influx of drugs constituted a “national emergency” that justified the tariffs.
Photo: AFP
However, the three judges of the US Court of International Trade ruled that Trump had overstepped his authority, barring most of the restrictions announced since he took office in January.
The White House said that “unelected judges” have no right to weigh in on Trump’s handling of the issue.
“President Trump pledged to put America first, and the administration is committed to using every lever of executive power to address this crisis and restore American greatness,” Trump’s spokesman Kush Desai said.
Attorneys for the administration filed to appeal the ruling.
One of Trump’s White House aides, Stephen Miller, wrote on X: “The judicial coup is out of control.”
Trump unveiled sweeping import duties on most trading partners on April 2, at a baseline 10 percent, plus steeper levies on dozens of economies, including China and the EU.
Taiwan faced 32 percent tariffs.
The ruling also quashes duties that Trump imposed on Canada, Mexico and China separately using emergency powers.
Some of the turmoil was calmed after he paused the larger tariffs for 90 days and suspended other duties, pending negotiations with individual countries and blocs.
Asian markets rallied yesterday after the ruling, while European and US futures also pointed to early gains.
Japan’s tariffs envoy Ryosei Akazawa said as he left for a fourth round of talks in Washington that Tokyo — reeling from tariffs on vehicles — would study the ruling.
The federal trade court was ruling in two separate cases — brought by businesses and a coalition of state governments — arguing that the president had contravened the US Congress’ power of the purse.
“The question in the two cases before the court is whether the International Emergency Economic Powers Act [IEEPA] of 1977 delegates these powers to the president in the form of authority to impose unlimited tariffs on goods from nearly every country in the world,” the three-judge panel wrote in an unsigned opinion.
“The court does not read IEEPA to confer such unbounded authority and sets aside the challenged tariffs imposed thereunder,” it added.
Additional reporting by staff writer
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