WORLD
US Supreme Court strikes down President Donald Trump’s tariff policy
- IBJ Bureau
- Feb 21, 2026
The US Supreme Court has stricken down a huge chunk of President Donald Trump’s far-reaching tariff agenda, delivering a major rebuke of the president’s key economic policy.
The law that undergirds those import duties “does not authorise the President to impose tariffs”, the majority has ruled 6-3 in the long-awaited decision.
The ruling is a massive loss for Mr Trump, who has made tariffs – and his asserted power to impose them on any country at any time, without Congressional input – a central feature of his second presidential term.
Mr Trump’s legal stance “would represent a transformative expansion of the President’s authority over tariff policy”, the majority concluded. And they highlighted that Mr Trump had imposed the tariffs without Congress, which has the power to tax under the Constitution.
Chief Justice John Roberts has delivered the opinion of the court. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh dissented.
The decision noted that before Mr Trump, no president had ever used the statute in question “to impose any tariffs, let alone tariffs of this magnitude and scope”.
To justify the “extraordinary” tariff powers, Mr Trump must “point to clear Congressional authorisation”, the court has writteb. “He cannot.”
The ruling was silent on whether tariffs that have been paid under the higher rates will need to be refunded. That sum could total $175 billion, according to a new estimate from the Penn Wharton Budget Model.
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