STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Even as President Trump imposes more tariffs, courts are considering a case that could wipe them out. A federal trade court already ruled the tariffs were illegal, that the president overstepped his authority under a law for economic emergencies. Trump appealed, and last week a federal appeals court heard the case. The court has yet to rule. Dan Rayfield was watching as a panel of 11 judges questioned lawyers from both sides.
DAN RAYFIELD: It is a very interruptive event, if that's a thing. So you begin, and you have the things that you want to talk about. But the judges have read the briefs. They're incredibly prepared. And they start interrupting you to ask questions.
INSKEEP: Rayfield is the Democratic attorney general for Oregon, which is one of the plaintiffs suing to overturn the tariffs. Like other observers in the courtroom, he felt that many judges seemed skeptical of the government's case.
RAYFIELD: You kind of got the impression from the judges and their questions that they do not buy that argument whatsoever.
INSKEEP: The assistant attorney general who made the argument for the government said Congress has long given the president broad discretion when there's an emergency. The president says there's a trade deficit. It's been going on for a long time. That's exactly what makes it an emergency, and he needs to do something.
RAYFIELD: So we, as the states coming in and arguing this, are not arguing with the ability or the deference that should be given a president with setting a national emergency. And that's the first law. They set the national emergency. And then that gives you access to the powers under this second law, which is IEEPA, or the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.
INSKEEP: You're not questioning that it's a national emergency, even though some people doubt that?
RAYFIELD: We're not questioning that. What we are getting into is, does IEEPA actually allow you to set tariffs at all? And the fascinating thing is they don't even use the word tariff in the Emergency Economic Powers law. So it says regulate. So we're having this dispute over, what does regulate mean?
INSKEEP: What gives the state of Oregon standing in this case?
RAYFIELD: Think about it. As a state, we're a direct importer of goods. So we have 80 agencies. We have three different procurement departments. So we direct import, but then also just as consumers, as Americans, those additional costs that is passed down to us, we're paying that as a state as well.
INSKEEP: Answer for me the three-word reply that supporters of tariffs might make in your situation. You're complaining about the higher costs of goods that the state of Oregon would import. They might say just buy American.
RAYFIELD: What I would say is you're looking at that. All of the American products - we live in a modern society. So even products that are made in America, we are still importing certain elements of products coming in here. And you're always looking...
INSKEEP: Like an automobile, to give an example.
RAYFIELD: Yeah, there are so many of those component parts. Of course, if we can produce things in America, we absolutely should. But the reality of a modern society, that is just not the case. Some countries in different societies or different areas are just geographically better suited to produce certain component parts.
INSKEEP: I have a memory years ago of being in your state, Oregon, and eating at some restaurant that overlooked the mouth of the Columbia River. And I watched as a ship came in, and it was a car carrier. It appeared to be full of automobiles from Japan or wherever they were coming from. I presume the entire economy of Oregon relies on imports to some extent or another.
RAYFIELD: Interesting, Oregon actually has a trade surplus. We have an incredibly large nursery industry. Our nursery industry is being impacted. So we export a lot to Canada.
INSKEEP: We're talking about plants here, I guess.
RAYFIELD: Plants, yeah. Nurseries, yeah, that's right.
INSKEEP: Yeah.
RAYFIELD: Not babies or anything.
INSKEEP: Just checking, just checking.
RAYFIELD: I mean, we do have plenty of nurseries as well. We have a shortage.
INSKEEP: Exactly but less of a surplus on those. Go on, go on.
RAYFIELD: Yeah. But on the plant side, we have these established relationships across the country, across the world. And so in Canada right now, 40 years of relationships in some of these nursery industries and Canada is pulling our products off the shelves.
INSKEEP: Suppose you win. What happens the next day?
RAYFIELD: The hope is that there would be an injunction pausing the current tariffs. At that point, the federal government would likely appeal to the Supreme Court and then ask the Supreme Court, would you please stay the order, which is basically like, hey, pause your order while the Supreme Court has the time to consider the merits of the case. And then we would, you know, rinse and repeat, as they say. And we would go through the same arguments with the Supreme Court, eventually looking to get a permanent injunction in place, which would pause the tariffs.
INSKEEP: Do you see this at all as part of a broader lawlessness with this administration?
RAYFIELD: It's tough to know why they're doing this. There are lawyers probably talking to the president that are saying, hey, this is not the best way to do this. I really see it as a movement to expand the executive powers. And so if they are able to be successful in the Supreme Court, the argument they're making is you can't review what we're doing with emergency powers, and you can't review it when we create an emergency.
I wish Republicans would play this out. I wish they would sit there and say, when we get the next Democratic president, what are they going to do if this goes forward? You know what? We're going to have an emergency on firearms, right? And what does that look like? We're going to have a climate emergency. Remember, courts can't review it. We learned that under President Trump.
INSKEEP: Dan Rayfield is the Democratic attorney general of Oregon. Thanks for coming by.
RAYFIELD: Hey, thanks for having me. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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