Analysis: What Appeals Court Tariff Decision Means for Taiwan

TaiwanPlus News

After the US Court of Appeals found most of US President Donald Trump's reciprocal tariffs to be not legal, TaiwanPlus spoke to James Ransdell, trade lawyer and partner at Cassidy Levy Kent, about what the decision means for Taiwan and the future of reciprocal tariffs.

Transcript

00:00So, James, the U.S. Appeals Court has ruled large parts of Trump's reciprocal tariffs

00:04unlawful.

00:06For the non-lawyers watching, what exactly did the court say and which tariffs are affected?

00:11So the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit was taking up the same set of tariffs

00:16that the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled was unlawful here a few months back.

00:21Those are the reciprocal tariffs as well as the set of so-called fentanyl tariffs, which

00:26applied to Mexico, Canada, and China.

00:29There were some more recent tariffs introduced on India and on Brazil.

00:36It doesn't extend to the more recent tariff actions.

00:39And the Federal Circuit's holding was that, at least in the view of the majority, so seven

00:43out of four of the full court, that those tariffs were unlawful.

00:49Ultimately, at this point, it's looking extremely likely that the Supreme Court is going to take

00:53this up.

00:54Tariffs have been one of U.S. President Donald Trump's most powerful foreign policy tools.

00:59If the Supreme Court takes this case, when might we actually learn whether or not the

01:04president has this authority?

01:05Since they've given an October 14th deadline, it seems likely that the Supreme Court would

01:11take it up within the next turn, which means, you know, in sort of a common case, it's about

01:17a nine month time frame.

01:19It could be faster.

01:20It could be three months faster.

01:22It could be three months slower.

01:25And it varies a lot within that time frame.

01:28Trump administration officials say that even if this authority is struck down, they have

01:32other legal tools to impose tariffs.

01:35Are they right?

01:36Are there other easy legal workarounds?

01:39The administration does have options.

01:41They have a gap filler option under Section 122.

01:45It's time bound, 150 days.

01:47It's capped at 15%, but they could do it in order to buy themselves time to act under other

01:53tariff authorities like Section 301, which is what the administration has relied on with

01:59respect to the tariffs on China, related intellectual property and that sort of thing.

02:04It would just take them some time.

02:06They'd have to go through a process.

02:07Whether or not these specific tariffs disappear, I wouldn't anticipate tariffs as a whole disappearing.

02:15There's just several different options that the administration has in terms of how they

02:20want to reach a very similar policy result.

02:25Taiwan has been negotiating a deal with Washington to lower its tariff level, and everyone has been

02:30waiting for the announcement of special tariffs on Taiwan's most valuable export, semiconductors.

02:36Now, those depend on a Commerce Department investigation, known as Section 232, that could be out

02:42any day now.

02:43Would this case have any effect on those special semiconductor tariffs?

02:48No, it wouldn't.

02:50It might have an effect on the negotiating dynamic.

02:54We've seen that Taipei is trying to negotiate, as many other countries have done, sort of collectively,

03:00the reciprocal tariff level as well as the level with respect to the Section 232

03:06investigations that they care about, which includes, obviously, semiconductors.

03:11And so, this opinion isn't going to have any direct effect on those at all.

03:16So, it might recolor the sort of negotiating dynamic between the two parties.

03:23It might recolor the sort of negotiating dynamic between the two parties.

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