California sued President Donald Trump and members of his administration Wednesday to stop the import tariffs levied under a 1977 law, saying the statute doesn’t give the president the emergency powers he used to justify the action.
The lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California asks the judge to find the tariffs unlawful and void them. The complaint says the International Economic Emergency Powers Act doesn’t authorize the use of tariffs.
Trump used IEEPA for a range of his tariffs, including the reciprocal tariffs that he ordered on April 2 and paused a week later. But a 10 percent baseline tariff remains in effect, as does a 145 percent tariff on goods imported from China.
