United States | Constraints on Tariff Man

Does Donald Trump have unlimited authority to impose tariffs?

Yes, but other factors could hold him back

A container ship sails as the sun sets in Bayonne, New Jersey, United States.
Photograph: Getty Images
|Washington, DC

THE ORIGINAL intention was for American presidents to be mere legal executors—not emperors able to impose their will unilaterally. Over time, though, Congress has ceded more and more authority to the executive branch, and the courts, the third coequal branch of government, have happily blessed the arrangement. Nowhere is this clearer than in trade policy.

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