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The Supreme Court is deciding if the president can use a trade deficit as an emergency to impose tariffs, challenging executive power over taxation.
The Supreme Court is reviewing whether the president can declare a trade deficit an emergency to impose broad tariffs, a move critics say unconstitutionally expands executive power over taxation.
Since 1991, Congress has used the emergency label to bypass budget caps and pay-as-you-go rules, authorizing about $12.5 trillion in emergency spending—plus $2.5 trillion in interest—accounting for roughly 10% of budget authority over the past decade.
The practice, largely self-policed, allows routine or permanent programs to be funded under temporary justifications, as seen in pandemic relief that extended beyond public health needs.
This erosion of fiscal discipline increases debt, raises taxpayer costs, and weakens the government’s ability to respond to true emergencies, prompting calls to restore the emergency label as a rare, temporary, and reviewable tool.
La Corte Suprema está decidiendo si el presidente puede usar un déficit comercial como una emergencia para imponer aranceles, desafiando el poder ejecutivo sobre la tributación.