President Donald Trump holds a chart as he announces a plan for tariffs on imported goods during an event April 2, 2025, in the Rose Garden at the White House.
Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post via Getty Images
A federal appeals court on Thursday is set to hear arguments on whether or not to kneecap President Donald Trump’s global tariff regime.
The oral arguments before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit are set to begin at 10 a.m. ET. They will be livestreamed on the court’s Youtube page.
Trump has held up the case as a life-or-death moment for his trade agenda.
“To all of my great lawyers who have fought so hard to save our Country, good luck in America’s big case today,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Thursday morning.
“If our Country was not able to protect itself by using TARIFFS AGAINST TARIFFS, WE WOULD BE ‘DEAD,’ WITH NO CHANCE OF SURVIVAL OR SUCCESS. Thank you for your attention to this matter!” he wrote.
The case, known as V.O.S. Selections v. Trump, centers on whether the president exceeded his authority by invoking an emergency-powers law to impose a slew of far-reaching tariff policies.
Trump had cited that statute, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, to justify his massive “reciprocal” tariff plan, which set a nearly global 10% baseline duty while slapping higher rates on dozens of individual countries.
Trump rolled out that policy in early April, but after markets convulsed in response he quickly delayed the higher tariffs from taking effect.
Many of those tariffs — including revised rates for countries that have struck agreements with the U.S. or have been targeted by one of Trump’s recent trade letters — are set to snap back into place Friday.
Trump also invoked IEEPA as his authority to impose tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China over alleged cross-border threats.
The last court to hear the case, the U.S. Court of International Trade, struck down both Trump’s reciprocal and “trafficking”-related tariffs in late May.
But the Federal Circuit quickly paused that decision, keeping Trump’s tariffs in effect while the legal challenge plays out.
There are numerous other active lawsuits challenging Trump’s tariffs, but V.O.S. is the furthest along and its outcome could dictate how the other cases fare.
“We will continue to defend President Trump’s executive authority in courtrooms across the country,” Attorney General Pam Bondi wrote on social media before the arguments began.
This is developing news and will be updated.
