If President Donald Trump wants to continuing imposing his sweeping tariff policies, he’s going to have to find another statute to apply as his authority.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday struck down Trump’s tariffs that he pursued under a law meant for use in national emergencies. The 6-3 decision (Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh dissented) rejects one of his most contentious assertions of his authority in a ruling with major implications for the global economy.
Trump has leveraged tariffs – taxes on imported goods – as a key economic and foreign policy tool, a move central to the global trade war Trump initiated soon after he began his second term. He announced the policy in April on a day he called “Liberation Day.”
Trump’s tariffs were forecast to generate over the next decade trillions of dollars in revenue for the United States, which possesses the world’s largest economy. According to a report from Reuters, the Trump administration has not provided tariffs collection data since Dec. 14.
But Reuters reported that Penn-Wharton Budget Model economists estimated the amount collected in Trump’s tariffs based on the International Emergency Economic Powers Act stood at more than $175 billion. And that amount likely would need to be refunded with a Supreme Court ruling against the IEEPA-based tariffs.
The U.S. Constitution grants Congress, not the president, the authority to issue taxes and tariffs.
The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that if all current tariffs stay in place, including the IEEPA-based duties, they would generate about $300 billion annually over the next decade. Total U.S. net customs duty receipts reached a record $195 billion in fiscal 2025, which ended on September 30, according to U.S. Treasury Department data, Reuters reported.
Following the Supreme Court’s decision We Pay the Tariffs, made up of small business members from across the country, discussed the importance of the decision and swift refunds, launching a national sign-on letter campaign that has already been signed by hundreds of businesses calling for “full, fast and automatic” refunds.
“Today’s Supreme Court decision is a tremendous victory for America’s small businesses who have been bearing the crushing weight of these tariffs,” Executive Director Dan Anthoiny said in a statement. “Our coalition members, who through hard work, late nights, and sweat equity built local businesses, have paid billions in tariffs that never should have been imposed.
“But a legal victory is meaningless without actual relief for the businesses that paid these tariffs,” he added. “The administration’s only responsible course of action now is to establish a fast, efficient, and automatic refund process that returns tariff money to the businesses that paid it. Small businesses cannot afford to wait months or years while bureaucratic delays play out, nor can they afford expensive litigation just to recover money that was unlawfully collected from them in the first place. These businesses need their money back now.”
