Alternative Routes for Trump Tariffs ‘Right Way to Go’ Following SCOTUS Strike-Down: Analyst

Joining us now to discuss the High Court's tariffs ruling is Tim Docher, Executive Director at Unleash Prosperity. Now, good to have you with us today, Tim. Now, Treasury Secretary Scott Besant said the Supreme Court's ruling did not say the President couldn't impose tariffs. Rather, he couldn't use AIPA. And Trump and Besant said tariffs would remain in effect and 2026 revenue would remain unchanged through the use of several other provisions. Those are Section 122 authority, mined with potentially enhanced Section 232 and Section 301 tariffs. Could you explain how these alternative pathways work? How much time do you have? Right. This is a very, very complex ruling. It really is because this was a novel avenue for the President to unilaterally slap tariffs on other countries without going to Congress. And we just need to point out that it's a good thing to have clarity from the High Court saying that taxes exist and they initiate in the Congress where the people can have a vote. It can't just unilaterally come for an unspecified amount of time under the guise of an emergency. Now, what can be done in terms of an emergency are the things that you can directly link to that. And that's what you're talking about with things like Section 232 or 112. These are all areas that have been carved out that President Trump actually used in the first term. Ambassador Lighthizer in the first term put those steel tariffs on. Those remain during Biden and they remain to this day, even after the Supreme Court ruling. There are lumber tariffs. There are tariffs on copper. The case has been proven that these are national security issues. Therefore, we need to have the tariff on. So what you're going to see here is you're going to see President Trump make the case for a whole lot of other tariffs falling under these provisions, and then you're just going to have to see if Congress takes those up and makes them permanent. Okay. Looking at the current tariffs, the Supreme Court didn't mention anything about refunding the collected tariffs, but there are over 1,000 companies now filing suit. What happens with those collected funds? Well, the court, as we heard in the great segment before, that's going to go to a lower court. They're going to adjudicate that. And I believe if something is found illegal, then there should be repayment on things that have been paid for an illegal thing. So I do think both logically and legally, that's a good thing. We need to make sure people are made whole. Now, the courts didn't specifically say that because, again, this is a novel case, and so they're going to allow the lower courts to determine these cases one by one. So it could be a mess. It could definitely be a long time coming, but I think that this is the right route to go. So the most high-profile company that joined the suit against Trump's tariffs is Costco. But most of the largest retailers have not yet joined, including Amazon, Walmart, Target, Home Depot, Lowe's, Walgreens, CVS. Why do you think they didn't join in? Well, you mentioned a couple of things. Home Depot, I know, they're not as reliant on tariffs, on goods coming in from foreign countries. A lot of these places, they may not be as reliant on goods coming in from foreign countries. Remember, this is $175 billion. Look, that's a lot of money. I'm not trying to downplay that. But in the span of a multi-trillion dollar economy, the tariff issue is relatively small. So you have to weigh out what is their move. They are processing all the information. What is their loss? What is their damage? And so with a bigger company like Amazon, it's going to take maybe a little bit of time. All right. Now, Trump has used the threat of tariffs to end wars and to onshore manufacturing. Democrats say the end result, though, is higher prices for Americans. The latest inflation numbers are currently at around 2.4 percent for January. What's your take on the effects of tariffs and the price of goods? Well, look, tariffs are a tax. Longstanding tariffs on the consumer do result typically in higher prices. But the thing is, is if you look at these tariffs over the last year, we haven't really seen them hitting consumer products, really. Maybe to a slight extent, but not really. I mean, the inflation numbers are coming from shelter and rent and things like that. The growth in those are coming down. You're seeing a lot of the inflation growth coming down in all the other areas. So we actually haven't seen that materialize yet. So the Democrats may be getting ahead of their skis. Now, let's just say this. The inflation number still is a little bit too high. We should be at 2 percent growth, not 2.4 percent growth in inflation. But I will say this. It's really, really hard to get down to that 2 percent target after President Biden took us all the way up to 9.2 percent in July of 2022. There's a lot to recover from. A lot of money was spent that we didn't have. And that did shockwaves throughout the economy. And we're still recovering from that. So while this is definitely, we don't like tariffs on for long term amounts of time, we like tariffs to make deals, which allows us to grow and have access to the markets and have people have better access to our markets. So for workers, for small businesses and businesses of all scales, what should they be watching for now that this ruling has come down? I think that we need to figure out, again, we need to figure out the retainment, how that's going to go. And I think we need to figure out what are we going to do in terms of doubling down on making these trade deals stick? Look, we talked about, we heard about the EU saying, well, we need certainty. Well, join the club. We all need certainty. But the bottom line is, is that you weren't giving us access to your markets and yet you were charging us higher tariffs. You know, we were giving you access to our markets and we weren't charging you high tariffs. So we got to make sure that these countries understand that we're here to stay. We're going to continue to press the button on these issues. And by the way, like we said, some of those tariffs are not going to be lifted because they are under provisions that the court sees as a legitimate national security concern. So what consumers have to figure out is, is are we going to continue to double down on regulation cutting, on tax cutting, on removing that barrier from businesses' ability to grow? And are we going to continue to double down on these trade deals, which of course is the president's number one concern at this point. And I think that we're going to find a way to do that. Certainly with President Trump at the helm, he seems determined to continue on with those policies. Great to review the latest with you. Tim Docher, thank you so much. You got to take a breath after that one, Stephanie. Right.