FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump delivers remarks on tariffs in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., April 2, 2025. REUTERS/Carlos Barria/File Photo
A right-wing legal advocacy group, usually known for its war on the regulatory state, is filing a lawsuit to stop President Donald Trump's major new pet policy.
The New Civil Liberties Alliance is few people's first idea of a Trump foe. Founded in 2017 and operating on funding from organizations tied to uber-GOP legal activist Leonard Leo and the infamous "Koch network," the group takes on cases to strike down regulations or strip power from federal agencies — a major priority of Trump himself. The group filed an amicus brief in the landmark Supreme Court case that overturned Chevron deference and let judges disregard legal interpretations of subject matter experts at federal agencies — a major goal for GOP activists ever since Democrats came to dominate administrative agencies.
In some ways, their latest lawsuit is still about reducing regulatory power — but this time, it concerns the power of Trump to use emergency law to declare new tariffs.
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"President Trump imposed the tariff by invoking the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA)," said the NCLA's press release. "However, this statute authorizes specific emergency actions like imposing sanctions or freezing assets to protect the United States from foreign threats. It does not authorize the President to impose tariffs. In its nearly 50-year history, no other president — including President Trump in his first term — has ever tried to use the IEEPA to impose tariffs. NCLA’s lawsuit does not quibble with President Trump’s declaration of an opioid-related emergency, but it does take issue with his decision to impose tariffs in response, without legal authority to do so."
The NCLA's plaintiff in the case is Simplified, a company based in Florida that sells home management products, and relies on imported materials from China to stay profitable.
“By invoking emergency power to impose an across-the-board tariff on imports from China that the statute does not authorize, President Trump has misused that power, usurped Congress’s right to control tariffs, and upset the Constitution’s separation of powers,” stated NCLA senior litigation counsel Andrew Morris.
Trump's new tariff plan, which he unveiled this week in an event he called "Liberation Day," imposes new so-called "reciprocal" import taxes ranging from 10 percent to 49 percent on goods from virtually everywhere in the world — even uninhabited Antarctic islands with no industry or trade at all. The stock market reacted to the news with a frantic sell-off, and some economic forecasters are fearful a recession will develop if the policy continues as planned.