Tales from the Tariff Trenches

From economics.bmo.com

In February, the Supreme Court ruled that tariffs justified by the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA) were unlawful. Up until then, this had been the basis for most of the duties introduced by the Trump Administration: the ‘fentanyl’ tariffs on Mexico, Canada, and China; the country-specific ‘reciprocal’ tariffs on scores of others, the 10% global base tariff, along with the ‘geopolitical’ tariffs on Brazil and India. IEEPA was embraced by the Administration because tariff actions did not require formal investigations or congressional oversight, and many situations could be ... (full story)