Overview
- During Nov. 5 arguments in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump and Trump v. V.O.S. Selections, several conservatives, including Neil Gorsuch, Amy Coney Barrett and Chief Justice John Roberts, pressed skeptical questions about using IEEPA to impose broad tariffs.
- Roberts called the duties “the imposition of taxes on Americans,” spotlighting Congress’s role over taxation, while Barrett challenged whether “regulate importation” has ever conferred tariff authority and Gorsuch warned of one-way executive power creep.
- Lower courts have rejected the administration’s IEEPA theory but left the tariffs in place; Customs has collected roughly $89–90 billion that could be subject to refund claims if the Supreme Court rules against the government.
- The major-questions doctrine and the absence of the word “tariff” in IEEPA featured prominently, with justices probing separation-of-powers limits on delegating economically significant decisions to the executive.
- Prediction-market odds that the tariffs survive fell to about 25% and U.S. stocks rose after the hearing, while experts note the administration could pivot to other statutes such as Sections 301 or 232 if IEEPA is curtailed.