Court of International Trade strikes down Trump tarriff

Two more judges trying to save Trump from himself:

A panel of federal judges on Thursday found President Trump had violated the law when he imposed a 10 percent tariff on most U.S. imports, dealing yet another legal setback to the White House in its efforts to wage a trade war without the express permission of Congress.

In a split ruling, the Court of International Trade found that Mr. Trump had wrongly invoked a decades-old trade law when he applied those duties beginning in February. The president imposed the levies after his previous set of punishing tariffs was struck down by the Supreme Court.

The decision appeared to place, for now, new limits on Mr. Trump’s trade powers, which he has wielded aggressively in hopes of resetting relationships with allies and adversaries, raising new revenue and encouraging more companies to make their products in the United States.

While the court declared Mr. Trump’s tariffs to be illegal, it only explicitly blocked their collection from small businesses and some states that had sued over their legality. It remained unclear how the administration would interpret that order, though it is widely expected to appeal.

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The two intricate concepts reflect lawmakers’ concerns back when the U.S. dollar was pegged to gold, creating economic risks that the president might need to manage using tariffs. But the dollar is no longer pegged to that commodity, prompting a coalition of states and a group of small businesses to sue the Trump administration this spring, arguing that he did not meet the criteria under law to apply his 10 percent tariff.

Part of the problem remains that a sclerotic Congress leaves all these anachronistic authorities lying around like a loaded weapon, but that’s no reason for courts to act when presidents try to push beyond what is delegated in the statute.