Resolution Criteria
This market resolves to YES if, by December 31, 2025, either:
A U.S. court (including the Supreme Court) issues a ruling that significantly limits President Trump's authority to impose or negotiate tariffs, OR
Congress passes legislation that significantly limits the President's tariff powers, and this legislation either becomes law or overrides a presidential veto.
"Significantly limits" means the action substantively restricts the President's ability to impose tariffs unilaterally, beyond minor procedural hurdles. This could include striking down specific tariff orders, invalidating the legal basis for certain tariffs, or creating new statutory constraints on presidential tariff authority.
Background
President Trump has indicated plans to use tariffs extensively in his second term, including potentially invoking the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to justify broad tariff actions. In April 2025, Trump announced a 10% global tariff and an additional 11% tariff on Chinese imports.
The Constitution gives Congress primary authority over trade, but various laws passed over decades have delegated significant tariff powers to the executive branch. The President can impose tariffs under several statutory authorities, including Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act (national security), Section 301 of the Trade Act (unfair trade practices), and the IEEPA (national emergencies).
Considerations
Courts have historically been reluctant to overturn presidential actions on trade and national security. However, the Supreme Court's "major questions doctrine" could potentially be applied to limit executive authority on tariffs that have significant economic impact without clear congressional authorization.
For Congress to successfully limit presidential tariff authority would likely require a veto-proof majority (two-thirds in both chambers), as the President would likely veto any legislation restricting his trade powers.
Update 2025-04-08 (PST) (AI summary of creator comment): Additional Conditions for Court-Ordered Limitations:
Duration Requirement: The limitation must be in effect for more than one week.
Effective Tariff Impact: The ruling must result in a change to the actual effective tariff rates, rather than being a temporary measure pending further judicial review.
Update 2025-05-06 (PST) (AI summary of creator comment): Regarding court-ordered limitations:
A court order that meets the criteria for limiting Trump's tariff authority will be considered for a YES resolution even if President Trump attempts to ignore or defy such an order.
The conditions that the limitation must be 'in effect' for more than one week and 'result in a change to the actual effective tariff rates' are satisfied if the court's ruling legally mandates these outcomes. This applies irrespective of immediate executive compliance or de facto changes (or lack thereof) in applied tariffs due to such defiance.
1,000People are also trading
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V.O.S._Selections,_Inc._v._Trump
Are you going to resolve this based on court orders, regardless of whether Trump attempts to ignore it?
@MaxMorehead https://www.vox.com/economy/412966/supreme-court-tariffs-donald-trump-trade-vos-selections
To my non-expert eye, looks good for the plantiffs on major questions and on whether the emergency declaration and the other surrounding conditions in the law are justiciable. Looks bad for them on whether "regulate" includes tariffs, which I thought was a bit of a bunk argument anyways. Nondelegation is a bit hard to figure out and might require somewhat novel law to come down on the side of the plantiffs.
My worry is that the bar for a preliminary injunction might be pretty high. But given how important this case is though, the courts might want to handle it fast. And if the plantiffs do win at this level, I don't know if the Supreme Court would want to quickly overturn.
@MaxMorehead also various recent events have me relatively certain at least 7/9 of the justices are willing to be adversarial with the Trump administration and think independently from MAGA dogma.
@MichaelEdgar yes, if he is significantly limited for a period of time greater than a week. No if it does not change actual effective tariff rates while waiting for Supreme Court