U.S. Appeals Court Extends Pause on Trade Ruling Blocking Trump's Tariffs

TMTPOST -- A federal appeals court determined to extend its pause on the lower U.S. court’s ruling blocking the Trump administration’s tariffs on worldwide trading partners, effectively remaining the levies including so-called reciprocal tariffs in effect until at least the end of July.

Credit：Xinhua News Agency

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, D.C. concluded a stay of the Court of International Trade’s rulings enjoining certain U.S. President Donald Trump’s executive orders imposing tariffs is warranted under the circumstances, thus ordered the motions for the stay pending appeal are granted, according to a brief ruling released Tuesday evening.

The appeals court directed the parties involved in the case to jointly file a proposed expedited briefing schedule within two business days from the issuance of the order. The court said the proposed briefing schedule should allow for it to hold oral argument on July 31. It added that the joint submission should include the parties’ alternative proposals if they cannot agree on a schedule. That means the appeals court intends to hear arguments on July 31, and the existing tariffs imposed by the Trump administration are set to stay in place through July unless there are further court actions in the case.

The appeals court asked all of its active judges to join in the case, according to the ruling, without offering the court’s reasoning. The losing party, either the plaintiffs, New York and 11 other states, or the defendants, the Trump administration, is expected to seek review at the Supreme Court.

The three-judge Court of International Trade in Manhattan on May 28 ordered permanently halt orders regarding tariffs and barred all modifications to them, blocking the Trump administration’s tariffs dating back to February 1, including the reciprocal tariffs against almost all the U.S. trading partners announced on April 2, the self-proclaimed “Liberation Day”.

The panel of federal judges ruled the the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA), that Trump invoked to justify the tariffs, doesn’t authorize any of the Trump’s tariff order. "The court does not read IEEPA to confer such unbounded authority and sets aside the challenged tariffs imposed thereunder," the judges said in their decision.

The Trump administration appealed the trade court’s ruling at night on May 28 to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The next day, Trump suggested the administration would seek a Supreme Court battle to challenge the ruling. "Hopefully, the Supreme Court will reverse this horrible, Country threatening decision, QUICKLY and DECISIVELY," the president wrote in a social media post .

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on May 29 granted a request from the White House to temporarily pause the Court of International Trade’s ruling. The "request for an immediate administrative stay is granted to the extent that the judgments and the permanent injunctions entered by the Court of International Trade in these cases are temporarily stayed" until at least June 9 while the appeal court considers whether the ruling should be suspended for a longer period, according to the appeals court.