Court reviews Trump 10% tariff
A U.S. trade court is weighing the legality of President Trump’s 10% global tariff after states and businesses argued it sidesteps a Supreme Court ruling that struck down earlier tariffs. The litigation keeps trade policy uncertain and complicates sourcing and pricing decisions for companies that rely on stable tariff regimes. (reuters.com).
A court in New York spent Friday asking whether President Donald Trump can keep a 10% tax on imports from nearly every country after the Supreme Court already knocked out most of his earlier tariff program on February 20, 2026. The case is in the U.S. Court of International Trade, the specialty court that handles fights over customs and trade rules. (reuters.com, congress.gov) The new tariff took effect on February 24, 2026, just four days after the Supreme Court said the International Emergency Economic Powers Act does not let a president impose tariffs. Trump’s team switched to a different law, Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, to keep a broad import tax in place. (reuters.com, politico.com) That switch is the whole fight. The states and small businesses suing say the White House lost one legal key, then tried a different key on the same locked door. (reuters.com, usnews.com) Section 122 is a narrow law Congress wrote for balance-of-payments problems, which is a dry term for a country sending more money abroad than it is taking in. It lets a president put on temporary import surcharges, but only up to 15% and only for 150 days unless Congress acts. (politico.com, tradecomplianceresourcehub.com) The plaintiffs say the United States is not in the kind of payments crisis Section 122 was built for, so using it for a near-universal tariff stretches the law past recognition. Reuters reported that 24 mostly Democratic-led states joined the challenge, along with two small businesses. (reuters.com, carolinajournal.com) The Supreme Court case behind all this was Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump and Trump v. V.O.S. Selections, Inc. In that 6-3 ruling, the justices said the 1977 emergency law Trump had used before does not authorize tariffs, which cut away the legal foundation for much of his earlier trade program. (congress.gov, scotusblog.com) Not every Trump tariff is in this case. Reuters said the lawsuits do not challenge separate tariffs on steel, aluminum, and copper that were imposed under other, more traditional trade authorities. (reuters.com) For companies that import parts, the problem is not just the 10% itself. A factory buying motors from Germany or packaging from Vietnam has to decide today whether to raise prices, rewrite contracts, or reroute suppliers while the court is still deciding whether the tariff survives. (reuters.com, cfr.org) The legal question is bigger than one tariff line. If the court blesses this use of Section 122, presidents will have a fresh path to broad import taxes after the Supreme Court shut the emergency-law route; if it rejects it, Congress regains more control over who can tax imports and when. (politico.com, cfr.org) So the hearing on April 10 was really about a basic constitutional question dressed up as a trade case: when the president wants to tax goods at the border, how much of that power belongs to the White House and how much belongs to Congress. The answer will shape not just this 10% tariff, but the next president’s playbook too. (congress.gov, scotusblog.com)
