A promise made by Donald Trump to desperate American farmers during a press availability may blow up on him if the Supreme Court disagrees with his administration on tariffs.
Appearing with Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Oval Office on Thursday, Trump was asked about farmers facing ruin, in large part because of the trade war he is waging on the world.
Mistaking billions for millions, he initially replied by bragging about the money he claimed his trade tariffs were bringing in.
“The other day, it was very interesting, they found $31 billion. They said, ‘Sir, we’ve found 31.’ I said, ‘You mean positively, right?’ They said, ‘Yeah, $31 million more than we knew.’ And they said, ‘We don’t know where it came from.’”
He continued, “So what we’re going to be doing is we’re going to be taking some money from all of the tariff money we’ve taken and we’re going to distribute it to our farmers, until the tariffs kick in to their benefit.” He added that they would “be making a fortune” due to his policies.
This followed Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins stating on Wednesday that there is “potential” to distribute tariff money to beleaguered growers of crops like soybean, corn, wheat, sorghum, and cotton, who have complained that tariffs have decimated their businesses.
However, as the New Republic’s Ellie Quinlan Houghtaling pointed out moments after Trump concluded his press conference, the Supreme Court might have something to say about that.
“That plan could be completely upended, however, if the Supreme Court decides that Trump’s tariffs are illegal,” Houghtailing predicted.
According to USA Today, an adverse ruling on tariffs, with a hearing expected after a hearing in November, would make that money unavailable because the U.S. government would then be obligated to refund between $750 billion and $1 trillion to those directly impacted by the tariffs already.
The New Republic report added, “Of course, farmers may have avoided these difficult times altogether if Trump had never instituted his aggressive tariff plan to begin with. Tensions between the Trump administration and Beijing have practically halted trade with China, nixing a crucial market for American farmers.
"The end result, according to insiders, is a mandatory bailout — which will weigh heavily on the American taxpayer’s dime.”