Trump admin warns it’ll take tariffs case to supreme court as soon as friday following sweeping ruling

The Trump administration on Thursday warned it would go to the Supreme Court as soon as Friday if a federal appeals court did not halt a ruling to block many of the president’s tariffs. In a

court filing in Washington, the Justice Department said Wednesday’s decision by the US Court of International Trade wrongly intruded upon President Trump’s executive authority. It asked the

US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to stop the ruling from taking effect while the White House pursues an appeal. “Absent at least interim relief from this Court, the United States

plans to seek emergency relief from the Supreme Court tomorrow,” the administration said in the filing. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt publicly called on the high court to

overturn the decision during during her afternoon press briefing. The judges “brazenly abused their judicial power to usurp the authority of President Trump to stop him from carrying out the

mandate that the American people gave him,” Leavitt claimed. EXPLORE MORE “These judges are threatening to undermine the credibility of the United States on the world stage,” she added.

“The administration has already filed an emergency motion for a stay pending appeal and an immediate administrative stay to strike down this egregious decision. But ultimately, the Supreme

Court must put an end to this for the sake of our Constitution and our country.” The three-judge panel on the Manhattan-based court ruled that federal law does not grant Trump “unbounded

authority” to tax imports from nations around the world and blocked 6.7 percentage points worth of the levies. The judes said Trump’s tariffs “exceed any authority granted” to the executive

branch and gave him 10 days to roll back the duties. White House spokesman Kush Desai condemned the decision Wednesday evening, saying that unfair trade relationships had “decimated American

communities, left our workers behind and weakened our defense industrial base – facts that the court did not dispute.” But major Wall Street banks on Thursday pointed out that Trump might

be able to keep many of his tariffs in place by taking advantage of specific trade laws. The court’s Wednesday decision, for example, does not pause duties on steel, aluminum and auto

imports, since these were enacted under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act, which allows the president to impose tariffs if excessive foreign imports pose a national security risk. “The

tariff levels that we had yesterday are probably going to be the tariff levels that we have tomorrow, because there are so many different authorities the administration can reach into to put

it back together,” Michael Zezas, Morgan Stanley’s global head of fixed income and thematic research, told Bloomberg TV on Thursday. Trump’s power to “raise and escalate — it might be a

little bit slower moving, but it is still there,” he added. Alec Phillips, chief US political economist at Goldman Sachs, wrote in a note to clients that the ruling “represents a setback for

the administration’s tariff plans and increases uncertainty but might not change the final outcome for most major US trading partners.” The Trump administration signaled it’s unlikely to

pursue alternative methods to levy tariffs while the court case plays out. “There are different approaches that would take a couple of months,” Kevin Hassett, director of the National

Economic Council, told Fox Business Network’s “Mornings with Maria” Thursday. “But we’re not planning to pursue those right now because we’re very, very confident that this really is

incorrect.” Goldman’s Phillips said he does not expect the court’s ruling to impact the massive Republican tax bill that passed the House last week since “tariff revenue was never counted

toward offsetting the cost of the package, and most lawmakers never made a clear link between the two issues.” Yet the tariffs were likely to raise nearly $200 billion on an annual basis –

approximately the same amount by which the spending bill would raise the deficit next year, Phillips wrote. “For now, we expect the Trump administration will find other ways to impose

tariffs,” he added, “so we still expect most of this revenue to materialize.”