President Donald Trump has spent most of 2025 imposing billions of dollars in tariffs on Americans whenever they buy goods from overseas. On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will finally debate whether the centerpiece of Trump’s economic policy is legal. The justices will likely delve into issues of presidential and congressional power, of Cold War-era laws and founding-era principles, and of the precise meanings of words like "regulate." Rarely has the court dealt with a case that could so directly affect so many Americans and so many livelihoods at once.
The case, Learning Resources v. Trump, originally came from a group of small businesses that are severely impacted by the tariffs. Unsurprisingly, they argued that that the tariffs were flatly illegal. "IEEPA does not authorize tariffs," they told the justices in their brief, referring to the law at issue in the case. "In the five decades since Congress enacted IEEPA, no president until now has invoked that law (or its predecessor) when imposing tariffs. That is no surprise: Unlike every actual tariff statute, IEEPA nowhere mentions ‘tariffs,’ ‘duties,’ or any other revenue-raising mechanism."
They managed to persuade the lower federal courts that the tariffs were illegal, prompting the Justice Department to seek relief from the high court. While most of their arguments were legal in nature, they also leaned heavily on Trump’s own claims about the tariffs’ importance on policy grounds.
