Losing My Perspicacity, May 30, 2025

Good morning and Happy Free Friday! Welcome back to another edition of Losing My Perspicacity — thanks so much for reading today.

As I finished up the newsletter last night, the US Court of International Trade had put a smackdown on Trump’s tariffs, saying what everyone knew: That Trump has wildly exceeded his authority in imposing reciprocal tariffs on international trading partners. If you’ll recall, the Constitution gives the power to levy tariffs to Congress, and Congress has passed legislation that delegates some of that power to the President under narrow circumstances. Trump, as he is wont to do, took those narrow circumstances and decided they meant he could do whatever he wanted. As we’ve seen over and over, the federal appellate courts have stopped Trump’s radical and unconstitutional agenda in its tracks.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt took it really well:

As with everything else that comes out of Leavitt’s mouth, I’m fairly sure none of that is true. I try my best not to beat up on young women when an old man is actually the Big Bad, but I’m starting to believe I need to make an exception for Ms. Leavitt here. The only other time I’ve heard so many blatantly false things come out of someone’s mouth is when Trump himself is talking — and possibly from George Costanza any time he spoke to a woman. This chick has the gall to wear a giant gold cross while lying to justify taking from the poor to feed the rich. She’s not a press secretary, she’s a propaganda minister.

But back to the tariffs. As soon as the ruling from the Court of International Trade came down, the Trump administration filed its appeal. Yesterday, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit stayed the lower court’s order pending the outcome of the appeal, which isn’t unusual. If you’ve never heard of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, it’s a special appeals court that only has jurisdiction over certain subjects, like patents, trademarks, government contracts, federal employee benefits, and the Court of International Trade. Basically, everything I hated learning about in law school.

At issue here is whether Trump improperly invoked the International Emergency Economic Powers Act as a basis to impose tariffs. The IEEPA was passed by Congress in 1977, granting the President broad economic powers during a national emergency. Trump claims that other countries being “very unfair” to the US in trade constitutes a national emergency. I can guarantee you that’s not what Congress had in mind when they passed the IEEPA two years after the end of the Vietnam War.

Other presidents have also used the IEEPA, albeit for much more limited actions.

For now, Trump’s tariffs will be allowed to stand, and I expect to see Trump’s lawyers dragging their feet to delay a ruling for as long as possible. If the White House fails with this court (likely), they’ll appeal to the Supreme Court, which is their ultimate goal.

The Trump White House has an opportunity here to back off the threat of tariffs and blame it on the courts. That’s what any sane administration would do. But Trump won’t do that, especially after the TACO incident on Wednesday.

The White House actually lost another tariff case yesterday, when a second federal judge blocked Trump tariffs and ruled in favor of an Illinois toy importer. In that opinion, Judge Rudolph Contreras wrote that the IEEPA “does not authorize the President to impose the tariffs.”

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