Opinion - Trump's tariffs are unconstitutional — we're suing to end them

Yahoo

15-04-2025

A small business in Florida is facing illegal tariffs imposed by the Trump administration on imports from China and other countries. Our organization, the New Civil Liberties Alliance, has filed a lawsuit in federal court because these tariffs are unlawful.
The company is named Simplified. It was founded by CEO Emily Ley and sells premium planners, organizational tools and home management products.
Simplified's suit challenges the president's effort to impose tariffs on Americans under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. Under these new tariffs, Simplified will have to pay large sums in tariffs alone, not to mention supply-chain changes. The tariffs force Simplified to charge its customers, often young mothers, more for its products.
The law was designed to allow presidents to impose sanctions on foreign adversaries in rapid response to international emergencies. It did not empower presidents to impose tariffs on the American people arbitrarily. The Constitution grants Congress exclusive power to regulate trade with foreign nations. Congress has done that by ratifying treaties and by delegating certain tariff functions to the president. But not here, and not in the statute that the president has invoked.
Presidents can impose tariffs only when Congress grants permission, which it has done in carefully drawn trade statutes. These statutes typically authorize tariffs only on industries or countries that meet specified criteria, only under specified conditions and after following specified procedures. Such statutes require advance investigations, detailed factual findings and a close fit between the statutory authority and a tariff's scope.
None of these things were done before Trump invoked the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, damaging Simplified's business and upending its supply chains. It is just such damage that Congress attempted to prevent in the statutes that do allow the president to impose tariffs.
In the law's nearly 50-year history, no president ever has used the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to impose tariffs. This is not surprising, since the statute does not mention tariffs, nor does it suggest it authorizes presidents to tax American citizens. Instead, it authorizes asset freezes, trade embargoes and similar such sanctions on other countries — not taxes on Americans.
Our suit does not challenge the president's declaration of an 'emergency.' Even granting the emergency, the law Trump has invoked limits presidents to actions that are 'necessary' to address the specific emergency at hand. Trump initially declared an emergency relating to China because of illegal opioids entering the U.S. But his executive orders imposing the China tariffs show no connection between the opioid problem and the tariff he ordered — much less that the tariff is 'necessary' to resolve that problem.
If Trump is allowed to use this law to bypass the statutory scheme for tariffs, he will have nearly unlimited authority to commandeer Congress's power over tariffs. He will be empowered to declare a national emergency based on some long-running problem, then impose tariffs purportedly in the name of that emergency — thus sidestepping the detailed constraints Congress has placed on the tariff authority it has granted. So not only do these executive orders damage Simplified in its business, they also deny Simplified the protection the Constitution promised when it assigned Congress sole control of tariffs and the regulation of commerce with foreign nations.
The executive orders imposing these China tariffs are unlawful for at least four reasons.
First, the statute's plain terms do not allow them. And because these tariffs raise a question of 'vast economic and political significance,' the Supreme Court's 'Major Questions Doctrine' does not permit these tariffs unless the law clearly authorized them.
Second, the president cannot show these tariffs are 'necessary' to the stated emergency, as the law requires.
Third, if the statute does authorize these tariffs, it violates the non-delegation doctrine, because Congress has not stated an 'intelligible principle' to guide the president in exercising its taxing power.
Finally, for all these reasons, Customs and Border Protection proceeded unlawfully when it changed the tariff schedule to comply with Trump's executive orders.
Simplified has paid every tariff lawfully issued. Neither Simplified nor any other business should be forced to pay unlawful tariffs unilaterally issued by the executive branch.
John J. Vecchione and Andrew J. Morris are senior litigation counsel at the New Civil Liberties Alliance.
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