The United States Supreme Court has struck down a central pillar of President Donald Trump’s economic agenda, ruling that the law he relied on does not give him the authority to impose sweeping tariffs on imports.
In a six-to-three decision delivered on Friday, the court said the emergency statute used by the Trump administration could not be stretched to remake global trade policy. Writing for the majority, Chief Justice John Roberts said the Constitution requires clear approval from Congress before a president can exercise such far-reaching economic power.
“The President asserts the extraordinary power to unilaterally impose tariffs of unlimited amount, duration, and scope,” Roberts wrote. “He must identify clear congressional authorisation to exercise it.”
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The ruling invalidates tariffs that had become the centrepiece of Trump’s second term economic strategy and a major tool of his foreign policy. It also marks the first major legal defeat for Trump’s expansive view of presidential power, after a series of high court decisions that had favoured him.
American media described the judgment as a significant rebuke. According to the Associated Press, the court made clear that it was not weighing the wisdom of tariffs themselves but the limits of executive authority. “We claim no special competence in matters of economics or foreign affairs,” Roberts wrote. “We claim only the limited role assigned to us by the Constitution.”
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Trump had imposed the tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, known as IEEPA, citing emergencies ranging from fentanyl trafficking to trade deficits. It was the first time in the law’s nearly 50 year history that a president had tried to use it to levy tariffs.
Lower courts had allowed the measures to remain in place while the case was under review. Those tariffs, which hit imports from Canada, China, Mexico, and dozens of other trading partners, raised costs for businesses and consumers and generated billions of dollars in revenue. Sector-specific tariffs on steel and aluminium, imposed under different laws, were not affected and will remain.
In recent weeks, Trump publicly warned that striking down the tariffs would damage the US economy. “We have taken in, and will soon be receiving, more than 600 billion dollars in tariffs,” he wrote on Truth Social. On another occasion, he said a ruling against him would leave the country “screwed”.
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The decision is now expected to trigger a wave of refund claims from companies seeking to recover billions paid under the invalidated tariffs. US media reported that major firms, including Costco, Toyota group companies and Revlon had already begun legal moves ahead of the ruling.
Despite a conservative majority on the bench, the justices showed deep unease about the administration’s use of repeated emergency declarations to justify a broad economic agenda. The judgment is likely to sharpen debate in Washington over the balance of power between Congress and the presidency, and the limits of emergency authority in peacetime.
