Item — HN Reader

"The ruling applies to his so-called "Liberation Day" tariffs, but not individual tariffs he's imposed on specific countries or products " -- So what's gonna happen next?

For countries that negotiated special treatment, they'll be stuck with a (now worse) deal?

For other countries, they'll return to the previous deal (non-tariff)?

3 comments

So I am far from an expert, but I saw that Capital Economics (a Macroeconomic analysis firm) put out a note saying that Trump still had power under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974. But there are three catches for that. First, it only lasts for 150 days unless Congress votes to approve them. Second, that it has to apply to all countries equally: meaning that it can't be used to give some countries a break if they sign a deal, so all of the deals are going to be unenforcable on America's end. Third, it caps the tariff rate at 15%.

Like with refunds, this is a mess of Trump's own making, and now we get to figure it out.

They've already voted once that a day isn't a day to avoid having to maintain some of his emergency declarations so I don't think that 150 day timer will actually end up running.

https://rollcall.com/2025/03/18/house-majority-rules-when-a-...

> First, it only lasts for 150 days unless Congress votes to approve them

what's the cooldown of this ability?

This is one of the things that drives me nuts about certain conservatives here in Canada who have been crying that Carney just "needs to make deal" (on some realpolitik basis) -- that would have been completely insanely bad bargaining. Everyone knew this court date was coming (and also that there's midterms this year). Why on earth would Canada show its belly to Trump when Trump himself was potentially about to be de-fanged? Why ink an unfavourable deal and then find two years later that we're stuck with it while the US political arena has changed?

As far as I know none of Trump's deals have been ratified by the Senate. None of them are valid.