Kyle Cheney

While I think he is winning most of the time there, this issue of tariffs is so central to his political identity, his economic agenda, what he views as his central, the centralization of that authority in the president, that it may erase a lot of the goodwill he's had for the court other than up till now.

Right.

And, you know, this is a court that has largely been solicitous of those kind of arguments in the past.

But here...

It's pretty explicit, and the two lower court rulings were pretty decisive against the president's position that he can use emergency authority to impose tariffs if he sees fit.

That somehow Congress delegated this to the president decades ago without ever specifically saying you can tariff whoever you want at whatever level you want, but somehow that's their interpretation.

And the court wasn't buying it.

Now, the only question I have is if they'll issue some kind of a nuanced ruling that allows the president to preserve kind of the current status quo, maybe through some alternative mechanism.

I think they've talked about other ways to levy those kinds of similar ability to raise revenue of other countries that aren't technically tariffs.

But again, the president's tenor doesn't sound like he's optimistic about where this is going to end up.

Yes, clearly.

I mean, the Department of Justice is more responsive to the whims and the calls of the president than any time in my memory.

Now, Trump has always accused the Department of Justice of being weaponized against him when they were investigating him, special counsels going after him.

But it's never been more explicit than it is right now, you know, when the president goes out on social media and says, these people should be prosecuted.

And then a few weeks later, we hear that

oh, by the way, grand jury subpoenas are going out or this person is under scrutiny, you know, or people are resigning in protests out in some of these offices because they're being told to carry out things that may fit what the president wants but aren't necessarily what the criminal justice system requires.

And, again, that's happening more frequently.

And, you know, look, Trump supporters say, good, you know, we're rooting out people that we think, you know, aren't doing the right job.

But at the same time, like,

There's a sense of alarm, a sense of fear and pressure to carry a political agenda in there that is more pronounced than I've ever seen it.