Washington Outsider Report Podcast Interview on the Trump Tariff Litigation

I was interviewed by attorney/podcaster Irina Tsukerman.

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Lawyer/podcaster Irina Tsukerman interviewed about the Trump tariff litigation for her Washington Outsider report podcast. The interview was conducted before the recent filing of new cases challenging Trump's IEEPA tariffs by twelve states led by Oregon and the Pacific Legal Foundation. Thus, we couldn't cover those two suits. But, otherwise, this is the most extensive interview I have done on the tariff litigation yet. Among other things, we discussed the case filed earlier by the Liberty Justice Center and myself. I cover the legal issues at stake in more detail in my Lawfare article, "The Constitutional Case Against Trump's Trade War."

Here is the video of the podcast:

Comments

[thesafesurfer]

"Trump's Trade War" certainly indicates a lack of objectivity.

[Supremacy Claus]

Ilya should disclose the amount of funding he and his university receive from Chinese and from Mexican drug cartel front organizations. Ilya seems to be supporting their interests.

[Sarcastr0]

Love the tariffs or you are a traitor for China and love drug cartels!

How do you think these weak accusations will play?

[SRG2]

There is a trade war (objectively true) and Trump started it (objectively true). So what are you complaining about?

[Speaking for normal people]

thesafesurfer puts something in quotes but doesn't say what it refers to. And is a lack of objectivity supposed to imply that therefore it's wrong. The best solutions to things are often devised by people who are intensely subjectively affected by what they are fighting for. I can make no sense of the above statement.
It's like the logical confusion between the words "immoral' and "amoral" an "F" in college Logic or Rhetoric class.

[Supremacy Claus]

Lawfare should carry the punishment of perjury. One is nitpicking a legal point to achieve a different purpose. It is lying to the court. All legal costs should be assessed to personal assets. From the law.cornell site: Perjury in federal court is governed by 18 U.S. Code § 1621, which states that anyone who willfully makes false statements under oath or subscribes to a false declaration is guilty of perjury. The penalties for perjury include a fine, imprisonment for up to five years, or both.
Additionally, 18 U.S. Code § 1623 provides further provisions for perjury committed in federal courts and grand juries, making it easier to prosecute false statements in judicial proceedings.

Bill Clinton signs a huge tax increase for the rich. They retaliate with an impeachment for the tiniest infraction, his lying in a deposition about a sexual matter. The lawyer scumbags and their wealthy sponsors should have paid the $70 million taxpayer cost, and been placed in general population in federal prison.

[Krayt]

Are you suggesting the Republicans facetiously went on fishing expeditions to find something, anything, to tag their hated political opponent with, to use it to try to get him removed from office?

To this day, they swear it is a vital and important legal principle that the chief law enforcement officer himself not lie under oath. And they're not wrong!

They got him! They got their hated political opponent and just missed removing him from office. Rats!

Ummmm, not because he was a hated political opponent, though. Not no way. Not no how.

No. It was honest, disinterested concern for rule of law.

[Riva]

Lots of noisy articles but no judicial overreach (yet and hopefully never). Might that be because the TROs/injunctions are not flowing freely from this particular spate of litigation since Democrats can't forum shop for the right judge up for the cause?

[ReaderY]

I agree that this particular statute does not authorize Trump’s tarriffs. Consistent with a long-standing pattern for Trump, he is attempting to invoke emergency powers granted by Congress in the absence of an emergency, and also going beyond what Congress authorized him to do.

That said, other statutes, while less flexible in the powers granted and requiring more in the way of procedure to invoke them, give the President some of the authority he is seeking. For example, the Trade Act of 1974 permits the President to impose limited tariffs to address a trade imbalance, which the United States certainly has at the moment. I suspect if President Trump had invoked the Act and followed its procedures and limitations, he could have gotten a substantial portion of what he wanted legally.

In general, because tariffs implicate foreign policy as well as taxes, I think the Constitution permits Congress to delegate tariff authority to the President, as long as it does so clearly. Congress did not do so in the statute the President invoked. But this is a matter of statutory interpretation. The President’s action was ultra vires with respect to the specific statute he invoked. But it was not inherently unconstitutional. It would be legal if done consistently with a properly worded statute.

[jb]

The current Supreme Court is just making up the limits on delegation as it goes along, so who knows what they'll think about the constitutionality of any of this.

As you say, though, Trump consistently manages to choose the most dubious rationales for his actions and as a result gets stymied by the courts. One of the things he apparently did not learn from his first time around is that how you do things matters a lot.