The Dictatorship

Trump’s tariffs are going to the Supreme Court — the justices’ decision should be an easy one

Published

10 months ago

September 3, 2025

Trump’s tariffs are going to the Supreme Court — the justices’ decision should be an easy one

Last week, a federal appeals court found that President Donald Trump’s imposition of sweeping tariffs on billions of dollars of goods coming into the U.S. exceeded presidential authority.

In doing so, that court merely applied recent rulings of the Supreme Court to the tariffs. In fact, the case against the tariffs is even stronger than the one filed against the Biden administration’s student loan relief planin which the justices had no problem halting assistance to millions of Americans.

On Tuesday, Trump said his administration will ask the Supreme Court to expedite the White House’s appeal of the verdict. When the justices ultimately hear the tariff casewill they simply apply their own precedent in a straightforward and even-handed way regardless of who is in the Oval Office? Or can we expect this court to, once again, impose a different set of rules when it is a Trump policy that is being challenged?

The power to impose tariffs is one explicitly provided for in the Constitution — but it is Congress that wields that power.

In 2022, as the nation was still recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic, Miguel Cardona, the secretary of education under President Joe Biden, invoked the Higher Education Relief Opportunities for Students Act (HEROES Act) of 2003 to cancel up to $20,000 in outstanding student debt for millions of American student loan borrowers. The law grants the secretary of education the power in a presidentially declared national emergency to “waive or modify” elements of federal student loans and develop new rules that would operate “in lieu of” existing program regulations — power that Trump’s first-term secretary of education, Betsy DeVos, exercised at the beginning of the pandemic.

The Biden-Cardona plan was challenged by several red state attorneys general. The Supreme Court’s conservative super-majority made quick work of the Biden plan, ruling, in a 6-3 decisionthat the loan plan exceeded the congressional grant of authority under the HEROES Act on several grounds, rendering it illegal.

First, despite the explicit language authorizing the administration to “waive or modify” student loan terms, the Court found that this authority did not include the power to simply cancel student debt. The majority would parse the terms “waive or modify” and find that the administration had the power to make “modest” and not wholesale changes to the program.

Second, the majority found that prior administrations had never exercised the relevant authority under the HEROES Act to cancel loans altogether. Since no prior administration had sought such authority, that suggested that no prior administration believed it had such authority.

Finally, the court surveyed the scope of the student loan program and determined that waiving hundreds of billions of dollars of potential revenue represented a significant portion of the federal government’s discretionary spending. Because of that, such a significant policy initiative could only be instituted with express congressional authority.

In doing so, the court turned to a doctrine the conservative justices had invoked several times against the Biden administration, what they have called the Major Questions Doctrine. According to this doctrine, when the executive branch exercises authority it claims Congress has granted to it with respect to a significant policy issue, that grant of authority must be clear and explicit.

Presidents have never exercised this sort of tariff power without congressional approval.

When one looks at the court’s reasons for invalidating Biden’s student loan program and applies them to the Trump tariffs, any fair reading of that prior decision — whether one agrees with it or not — means that the court should affirm the lower court’s decision: The Trump administration exceeded its authority when it issued a range of far-reaching and sweeping tariffs on global trade.

First and foremost, the power to impose tariffs is one explicitly provided for in the Constitution — but it is Congress that wields that power. That branch has granted some economic powers related to international trade to the executive, even emergency powers, but the main statute the Trump administration claims grants the president authority to impose tariffs as he chooses, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), never even comes close to doing so. In fact, it doesn’t even mention the term “tariff.”

Granted, the authority extended to the executive branch under the statute is fairly broad, lists many things the president can do in a declared emergency and provides procedures by which the president can do them. Nowhere, however, does it grant the president the authority to impose tariffs. So, unlike in the student loan case, the court does not have to interpret specific terms in a grant of authority and decide how far to extend that power given those terms.

Rather, the power to impose tariffs is not one of the expressly named powers in the IEEP. And when Congress grants some powers and withholds others, the president can only act in ways that are expressly authorized by statute. Here, there are no terms for the court to interpret; and it cannot read into a statute what is not there.

When we look to other grounds upon which the court’s conservative majority struck down the Biden student loan plan, the case is even more persuasive for this court to do the same with the Trump tariffs.

Presidents have never exercised this sort of tariff power without congressional approval. Moreover, the tariffs, by the president’s own claimswill bring in trillions of dollars to the U.S. economy, dwarfing even the massive impact the court claimed the student loan program would have.

For these reasons, in this case, in the absence of an explicit grant of congressional authority, there is an even stronger argument that can be made for the court to invalidate the tariffs under its prior rulings applying the Major Questions Doctrine.

Of course, there’s a good chance the court will side with Trump, which would only provide further evidence of what many Americans fear: that this court has a different set of rules for the Trump administration. Or, as Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote recently in a dissenting opinion involving the administration’s efforts to gut funding programs of the National Institutes of Health, the only rule is that there are no rules save one: that “this Administration always wins.”

Ray Brescia

Ray Brescia is a professor of law at Albany Law School and author of the book “The Private Is Political: Identity and Democracy in the Age of Surveillance Capitalism.”

The Dictatorship

Monday’s Campaign Round-Up, 6.22.26: Why Trump backed both Republicans in a key S.C. race

Published

10 hours ago

June 22, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Monday’s Campaign Round-Up, 6.22.26: Why Trump backed both Republicans in a key S.C. race

Today’s installment of campaign-related news items from across the country.

* In South Carolina’s gubernatorial raceDonald Trump endorsed Lt. Gov. Pam Evette last month. Last week, however, ahead of this week’s primary runoff election in the race, the president published an online item telling voters that “you can’t go wrong” with either Evette or state Attorney General Alan Wilson.

If this sounds at all familiar, it’s because Trump has done this before. Around this time two years ago, for example, he endorsed both Republicans running in a congressional primary in Arizona. And two years before that, he endorsed two leading contenders in a Senate primary in Missouri.

Only the president can say for sure why he ended up endorsing Evette and Wilson in the South Carolina race, though it’s worth emphasizing for context that GOP primary voters have already ignored his direction into two gubernatorial primaries this month, and it stands to reason that he hoped to avoid a third.

* We’re one day away from a variety of notable racesincluding but not limited to South Carolina’s gubernatorial race. There are also some congressional primaries in a handful of statesincluding Maryland, New York and Utah.

* In took a while, but the ballots have been tallied under Maine’s ranked-choice systemand we now know that Democrat Hannah Pingree, the former state House speaker, will face off against Republican Bobby Charles, who worked at the State Department during the Bush-Cheney era.

* As for Maine’s closely watched congressional racestate Auditor Matt Dunlap won the Democratic nomination in the battleground 2nd District, defeating state Sen. Joe Baldacci, who enjoyed the backing of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. Dunlap will run in the fall against a familiar figure: former Republican Gov. Paul LePage, who had moved to Florida a few years ago, but who returned to run for Congress.

* In California’s congressional special electiontwo Democratic candidates — state Sen. Aisha Wahab and Melissa Hernandez, a Bay Area Rapid Transit director — have advanced to an Aug. 18 special general election. The winner will fill the vacancy left by disgraced former Rep. Eric Swalwell, who resigned in April.

* In a new commercial shared first with MS NOWDemocrat James Talarico has launched his campaign’s first multimillion-dollar ad buy in Texas’ gubernatorial race. In the 30-second spot, Talarico focuses on affordability and the cost of living. The state lawmaker will face scandal-plagued state Attorney General Ken Paxton in the fall.

* And in New Jersey, Republican Rep. Tom Kean Jr.who has been missing from Capitol Hill since early March, will reportedly return to work on June 30according to a statement from his spokesperson. Neither Kean nor his office have offered any public information about why he has been away.

Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”

The Dictatorship

Trump tries dual endorsement in South Carolina as his pick for governor flounders in polls

Published

10 hours ago

June 22, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Trump tries dual endorsement in South Carolina as his pick for governor flounders in polls

Jun. 22, 2026, 11:39 AM EDT

After President Donald Trump’s pick for governor in Iowa lost in the Republican primary earlier this month, the president argued that he “would have endorsed the other person” if he had “the proper information.”

Trump is taking no chances in the South Carolina gubernatorial primary. Over the weekend he rescinded his exclusive endorsement of Pamela Evette, the lieutenant governor, announcing instead that he would support both Evette and her runoff opponent, Alan Wilson, the state’s attorney general.

The move put Evette’s political future in jeopardy: Even before Trump’s dual endorsement, she trailed in limited public polling and was seen by political observers in South Carolina as a weak candidate with little to show besides the president’s coveted endorsement.

“Her chief distinction from Alan Wilson was that Trump endorsed her,” said Dr. Dubose Kapeluck, a professor of political science at the Citadel Military College of South Carolina.

Trump’s dual endorsement “was a kiss of death,” he told MS NOW.

Evette, who moved to South Carolina from Ohio to found a successful payroll and HR company in 2000, has been lieutenant governor since 2019, serving under Gov. Henry McMaster, who is term-limited.

In office, she has pursued meaningful but little-celebrated policies, like a key tort reform bill, according to Gil Gatch, a Republican member of the South Carolina state House and an Evette supporter.

But voters could be forgiven for knowing little about Evette besides the fact that Trump endorsed her, which he did just days before the June 9 primary. Visitors to her campaign website are greeted with a full-screen message labeling Evette as “Trump-endorsed.” The first line in her X bio states the same. Pro-Evette television ads are quick to tout the endorsement.

An accomplishment like tort reform, while noted on Evette’s website, “maybe could have been something that was highlighted more heavily,” Gatch told MS NOW.

The political makeup of South Carolina nearly guarantees the next governor will be whoever emerges on Tuesday between Evette and Wilson. They survived a crowded primary field on June 9, and nearly every challenger who fell short of the runoff publicly endorsed the attorney general.

“She’s just not a good candidate,” Josh Kimbrell, a state senator who failed to make the runoff and has since said he’d back Wilson, said of Evette.

“She kind of assumed this was a coronation, and that was never going to go over that well,” he added.

Even some pro-Trump voters were confused by the president’s initial endorsement of Evette, whom he called “a good friend, fighter, and WINNER” in a social media post in May.

“I have no clue why Trump would endorse Pamela Evette,” Leland Lemmons, a 30-year-old Trump supporter told MS NOW as he exited a polling site in the Greenville suburb of Easley on June 9.

“She’s served, you know, a decent time. I just haven’t seen much fruition of what she’s done in office,” he added.

In a post on Truth Social Friday announcing his dual endorsement, Trump wrote, “I can’t hurt one of them by only Endorsing the other, so, therefore, I am going to Endorse, for Governor of South Carolina, both Pam Evette and Alan Wilson!”

In a subsequent statement on X, Evette said, “I was proud to come in first as [Trump’s] endorsed candidate for Governor on June 9th. Looking forward to doing it again on June 23rd.”

After The Washington Post foreshadowed the dual endorsement last Tuesday, allies of Evette were quick to denounce the possibility.

“I would guess that’s fake news,” Suzanne Pucci, a member of Evette’s finance committee, told MS NOW of the chance Trump would also endorse Wilson. “She’s probably not real worried about it.”

Another close ally and supporter told MS NOW at the time the report was “a total, fabricated lie.”

“[Trump] is invested in Pamela Evette because she invested in him. He’s a loyal guy. That kind of stuff is important to him,” added the supporter, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

“With or without Trump, I think she is going to win,” they said.

On Thursday, a senior campaign aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity, brushed off the idea of a dual endorsement, telling MS NOW in a statement, “Pamela Evette has earned the complete and total endorsement of President Trump. She is the only Trump-endorsed candidate in this race and we look forward to delivering a big win for the president on Tuesday.”

Roughly 24 hours later, Trump retracted the exclusive endorsement.

Will McDuffie is a reporter for MS NOW.

The Dictatorship

Fears of an ‘economic catastrophe’ helped push Trump toward an Iran deal

Published

10 hours ago

June 22, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Fears of an ‘economic catastrophe’ helped push Trump toward an Iran deal

As last week’s G7 summit in France got underway, a reporter asked Donald Trump whether his purported deal with Iran was final. “No, it’s not final,” the president replied. Later that day — during a visit to Versaillesof all places — he signed the framework anyway.

But moments after signing his name to the memorandum of understanding, Trump offered an unsubtle hint about what he was thinking at the time. Amid applause from those around him, the American president pointed down and then up while saying“Oil down, stocks up.”

In other words, Trump’s focus had nothing to do with natural security and everything to do with the economy. What’s more, the four-word phrase was part of a larger and underappreciated pattern. The Washington Post reported:

In the more than 100 days since President Donald Trump launched a war with Iran, he has offered a shifting list of reasons for why he started the conflict. But in explaining his push for peace, he named a priority much closer to home: protecting the stock market.

“I didn’t want to see economic catastrophe,” Trump told reporters gathered in the Alpine spa town of Évian-les-Bains, France, after the Group of Seven summit.

As the summit wrapped up, the Republican similarly said“I’ve studied presidents, some good, some bad, some great. Not too many are great and some really bad. … And the one president I did not want to be was the late, great Herbert Hoover. I didn’t want that and who knows what would have happened.”

He pushed the same point in an interview with Axios, which was released over the weekend.

“If I went further, the stock market would be much lower,” the president said. “Now think of this: I have one primary wish as president, in terms of people: I never want to be the late, great Herbert Hoover.”

The comments came days after Trump similarly argued“The alternative to this deal was a global recession. There are stupid people who want to see a global recession. They are just stupid people.”

Whether the president fully appreciates the implications of his own rhetoric, this string of comments doesn’t just shed light on his motivations for accepting a defeat, it also suggests he saw his failed policy in Iran as pushing the global economy toward a dangerous cliff.

In other words, based on Trump’s own comments, the war he started was poised to create an “economic catastrophe,” which he was desperate to avoid — and which led him to accept a framework that empowered Iran to get what it wanted in exchange for effectively no concessions at all.