Donald Trump has claimed he has “the absolute right” to impose new tariffs after the US Supreme Court ruled that many of the import duties he imposed last year were illegal.
The president attacked the court in a late-night broadside on Sunday, accusing it of having “unnecessarily LOOTED” the United States and not showing it enough loyalty.
In February, the Supreme Court determined that a 1977 law designed to address national emergencies did not provide legal justification for many of the tariffs the Trump administration had imposed on countries around the world.
The administration has struggled in recent weeks to rebuild its controversial trade agenda and regain economic influence.
Trump quickly imposed 10% tariffs on goods from much of the world under a different law, Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974. But these expire in 150 days, in July. While the president also promised to increase this temporary tax to 15%, he has not yet done so.
U.S. officials launched a series of trade investigations last week, setting the stage for the possible imposition of a new wave of permanent tariffs to replace those that were repealed.
“Our Supreme Court has made these countries very happy, but as the Court noted, I have the absolute right to charge TARIFFs in other ways, and I have already started doing so,” Trump wrote on social media on Sunday.
The Supreme Court decision did not say that the president had the absolute right to collect fees in other ways.
“This completely inept and disgraceful Court was not what our wonderful Founders created the Supreme Court of the United States to be,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. “They are harming our country and will continue to do so.”
He posted hours before U.S. officials met with their Mexican counterparts on Monday to discuss the future of their USMCA trilateral trade deal with Canada.
Trump will also meet with his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping, at the end of March, after an extraordinarily turbulent year for economic relations between Washington and Beijing. In an interview with the Financial Times on Sunday, he suggested his summit could be delayed, however, while urging a number of countries, including China, to send ships to the Middle East to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz.
The president of the United States has continued to use the economic power of the United States to try to pressure other countries despite the Supreme Court ruling. He threatened to cut off all trade with Spain earlier this month after his government refused to give the United States permission for two jointly operated bases in southern Spain to be used in American attacks on Iran.
