Former Governor and Congressman George Allen is warning of “escalating disruption” as he joins a lawsuit against President Donald Trump.
The disruption he is speaking about is the “sweeping use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to impose a 10 percent baseline tariff on nearly all imports alongside sharply higher duties targeting Chinese goods and foreign automobiles.”
Allen also criticized the 100 percent tariffs on foreign-made films, saying it “bolsters the point that this is not a genuine national emergency.”
“This legal challenge is not a debate over trade policy; rather, it is a case brought to preserve and honor the clear constitutional principle that taxation should be determined by Congress,” Allen wrote in a Washington Post column.
Allen says he is joined by a “coalition of political leaders from across the ideological divide” in the legal challenge.
“If courts permit this path to stand unreviewed, it will invite escalating disruption — not just to international commerce, but to the very norms that sustain constitutional governance,” they wrote in the case.
Their appeal is to “defend the separation of powers,” because they believe Trump’s trade deal is an “unconstitutional seizure of taxation power clearly vested in Congress.”
“It is dangerous to allow a president to impose such taxes by decree,” Allen wrote in the post.
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“Thus, in good conscience and principle, I signed on to the well-reasoned legal challenge to this unconstitutional presidential taxation in an amicus brief in the V.O.S. Selections, Inc. v. Trump case.”
He added, “The Constitution is clear that taxes are the purview of Congress, not a tool to be implemented by presidential proclamation.”
Allen also wanted to make very clear, “I am a strong supporter of this administration,” Allen said. “My position is based on my conscience as a conservative; I’m taking a stand for significant constitutional protections for free people and enterprise, not personalities nor hypocritical, situational principles.”