(Republicaninformer.com)- Even President Joe Biden says he believes that the Supreme Court recently handed down a decision that could be seen as a validation for former President Donald Trump.
Earlier this week, the high court decided not to hear an appeal from USP Holdings following lower courts’ decisions to reject claims they brought against the Trump administration. The plaintiffs in the case were alleging that the Trump administration didn’t act properly when it imposed tariffs on steel.
When the Biden administration took over the White House, they left those tariffs in place and didn’t touch them. Then, in this case, the Biden administration even defended the tariffs in court.
USP Holdings as well as some other companies have been alleging that the tariffs that were imposed on steel have damaged their businesses, since they import the product from overseas.
Politico reported that the tariffs were not favored by allies of the Biden administration nor many American worker groups. However, the current White House did want to keep some of the Trump administration’s policies intact when they took over.
That’s something that wasn’t lost on Scott Paul, who serves as the Alliance for American Manufacturing’s president. He said recently:
“The Biden administration understands that simply lifting steel tariffs without any solution in place, particularly beyond the dialogue, could well mean layoffs and plant closures in Pennsylvania and other states where obviously the impact would be felt not only economically but politically.”
The tariffs, which originally started being enforced on March 1 of 2018, imposed a 25% tariff on all steel that was imported from other countries. In addition, a 10% tariff was put on any aluminum that was imported from another country as well.
The idea, of course, is that by putting these tariffs on imports, companies here in the United States would turn to domestic steel and aluminum manufacturers, rather than importing those materials from elsewhere.
Not long after his administration originally put the tariffs in place, Trump tweeted:
“When a country (USA) is losing many billions of dollars on trade with virtually every country it does business with, trade wars are good, and easy to win. Example, when we are down $100 billion with a certain country and they get cute, don’t trade anymore – we win big. It’s easy!”
USP Holdings focused its case on the administrative machinations that led to the tariffs being approved. In a note they included as part of the petition to the Supreme Court, the plaintiffs claimed the report that was issued by Wilbur Ross, the then-Secretary of Commerce, that recommended the tariffs was actually in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act.
They claimed the report was ultimately “arbitrary and capricious.”
In 2021, the Trade Court rejected their argument, ruling that the report in question wasn’t a final action from the agency.
While the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit had a different take on the report itself, it still ruled against the plaintiffs, saying the tariffs didn’t violate the Administrative Procedures Act.
