Trump Imposes Massively Harmful and Illegal Section 301 Tariffs

If, somehow, Section 301 does authorize this action, it would violate the constitutional nondelegation doctrine, which limits delegation of legislative power to the executive. Tariffs are a specifically enumerated congressional power. While the Supreme Court’s nondelegation precedent is far from completely clear, last year’s decision in FCC v. Consumers’ Research held that delegations of the power to impose taxes and other financial levies must have a clear “floor” and “ceiling” and that “[t]he guidance needed is greater when an agency action will affect the entire national economy than when it addresses a narrow, technical issue” [quotation omitted]. There is no meaningful floor or ceiling under the administration’s approach to Section 301. And the power claimed is clearly one that massively affects the “entire national economy.” In the IEEPA case, the Supreme Court emphasized that "the president does not have the power to “impose tariffs on imports from any country, of any product, at any rate, for any amount of time.” Chief Justice Roberts went on to note that, while some statutes do grant the president tariff authority (among which he specifically cited Section 301), “[w]hen Congress has delegated its tariff powers, it has done so… subject to strict limits.”