Pollution pivot: A new way forward for Trump on tariffs

The Supreme Court’s ruling in the tariff case this year was a painful blow for advocates of using protectionism to reshape global trade. While the tariffs in question, which had been levied under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, accounted for less than half of President Donald Trump’s tariffs, the ruling nevertheless halted the administration’s ability to set reciprocal tariffs. While it has found some temporary workarounds, such as Section 122 tariffs, they are far from permanent.

This is a problem for the Trump administration’s goal of reshoring and reindustrializing the United States. Tariffs, which can be rather broad or very narrow, were an effective tool for the Trump administration’s goal of reshoring U.S. companies and reindustrialization. They were also starting to be accepted across the political spectrum, an under-discussed victory for the president. Having begun pushing protectionism in his first term, many of the president’s tariffs were kept by the Biden administration without complaint from Democrats.

But ironically, the Supreme Court’s decision could help further all of these goals by giving Trump an impetus to try tariffs in a new way: pollution tariffs, specifically on major adversaries such as China.

Read more at Washington Examiner.