United States President Donald Trump speaks to the Press before departs at the White House to Alligator Alcatraz, Florida on July 1, 2025, in Washington DC. <\/p>\n
Celal Gunes | Anadolu | Getty Images<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump<\/a>‘s politically charged new tariff threat \u2014 a blanket 50% duty on imports from Brazil \u2014 stretches an interpretation of his powers that is already facing a high-stakes court challenge.<\/p>\n Trump said in a letter Wednesday that he is imposing the massive new tariff at least partly in retaliation against Brazil’s treatment of its former president, Jair Bolsonaro.<\/p>\n But to do so, he is citing a law<\/a> that only grants him emergency economic powers in order to deal with certain foreign threats to the United States, a White House official told CNBC Thursday.<\/p>\n That same law \u2014 the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA \u2014 is at the center of an ongoing lawsuit over Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs that is currently before a federal appeals court.<\/p>\n Trump’s lawyers say his invocation of the law to impose those tariffs was an appropriate move to address multiple national emergencies, including “America’s exploding trade deficit.”<\/p>\n The White House did not immediately respond to CNBC’s questions about Trump’s letter to Brazil, including how Bolsonaro’s circumstances relate to Trump’s stated authority under IEEPA.<\/p>\n While the latest levy on Brazilian imports may not have a direct impact on the lawsuit already underway, critics say it could further erode the administration’s credibility as Trump pursues an aggressive trade agenda.<\/p>\n Trump’s letter announcing the tariff on Brazil “takes abuse of power to a whole new level,” said Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., in a statement Thursday.<\/p>\n Kaine vowed to “use all available means to block these latest job-killing tariffs.”<\/p>\n Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, accused Trump of attempting to “sacrifice the economy to settle his own personal scores, and it is far outside his legal authority.”<\/p>\n What’s IEEPA?<\/p>\n IEEPA gives the president some powers to deal with national emergencies stemming from “any unusual and extraordinary threat” that comes in whole or in large part from outside the U.S.<\/p>\n Trump previously cited IEEPA in early April, when he slapped 10% tariffs on nearly all other countries’ imports, plus higher rates on dozens of individual nations. His April 2 executive order<\/a> announcing those tariffs also formally declared a national emergency. <\/p>\n According to the order, foreign trade practices that “contribute to large and persistent annual United States goods trade deficits” have caused the loss of America’s “industrial capacity” and “compromised military readiness.” <\/p>\n Trump temporarily suspended the higher tariffs a week later, following a trading frenzy in global markets.<\/p>\n In late May, the U.S. Court of International Trade struck the reciprocal tariffs down, ruling<\/a> that IEEPA did not authorize Trump to impose them.<\/p>\n The judges in that case found that Trump’s assertion of “unbounded” tariff-making power “exceeds any tariff authority delegated to the President under IEEPA.”<\/p>\n But in June, judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit paused that decision from taking effect while the case is still pending.<\/p>\n “We’ll have to see” if Trump’s tariff letter to Brazil could factor into the appeal, said Ilya Somin, a law professor who is representing plaintiffs in the case against the Trump administration.<\/p>\n “For the moment, these new Brazil tariffs are not part of the case,” Somin said in a phone interview.<\/p>\n But he added that the letter “further underscores the indefensible nature” of Trump’s assertion that he has virtually “unreviewable discretion” on tariffs.<\/p>\n