Three Ways Trump’s Tariffs Could End

How Congress could take back its trade power.

Of all the wild swings in the stock markets this week, no moment has been more surreal than the frenzy that took place around 10 a.m. on Monday, when stocks suddenly started soaring in response to a dramatic headline: “HASSETT: TRUMP IS CONSIDERING A 90-DAY PAUSE IN TARIFFS FOR ALL COUNTRIES EXCEPT CHINA.”

As it turned out, President Trump was considering no such thing; the headline misstated comments on Fox News by White House adviser Kevin Hassett. But the announcement was shared widely on X by an anonymous account named Walter Bloomberg, which boasts a large following but lacks any connection to the Bloomberg news outlet.

Before long, the post was being read aloud on CNBC. In about 10 minutes, the S&P 500 added $2.4 trillion in market value. Then, the White House clarified that the report was false, and the index shed $2.5 trillion in value almost as quickly. The Dow Jones Industrial Average posted its largest intraday swing ever recorded.

The moment was a cautionary tale in fake news on social media driving real-life outcomes. (My Monday newsletter went out during the confusion, and I mentioned a version of the report, which I regret.) But it also serves as a signal of just how desperate Wall Street has been all week for any sign that some deus ex machina would emerge and wipe away (or at least postpone) the tariffs.

None has. Trump’s new tariffs went into effect at 12:01 a.m. this morning, impacting nearly every major U.S. trade partner (including 104% tariffs on China, which sparked a quick retaliation from Beijing).

So, is there any way to climb back down from the trade war now? The way I see it, there are three main ways for the tariffs to end: by Congress, by the courts, and by President Trump himself. Let’s walk through what each potential exit ramp would look like, one at a time.

1. Congress takes back its trade powers

The Constitution is explicit about which branch of government should be in charge of tariffs (although the Framers referred to them as “duties,” another word for import taxes): “The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises,” Article I, Section 8 says.

But, over the course of decades, lawmakers of both parties have forked that power over to the president, one of many issues that they’ve preferred to let the White House handle rather than having to take politically risky votes themselves. Congress’ constitutional powers remain intact, though, if they ever want to use them. Here are two ways lawmakers could reverse Trump’s tariffs:

1a. Congress revokes presidential trade powers. Enter the Trade Review Act of 2025, which was introduced by Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) last week. The measure would set a 60-day clock for any new tariffs imposed by a president. If Congress doesn’t approve the tariffs in that time, they would expire. This flips the onus from the status quo, in which any new presidential tariffs are assumed to be permanent unless Congress says otherwise; under this bill, any new presidential tariffs would automatically be temporary unless Congress says otherwise.

This isn’t just some Democratic fantasy, either. Seven Republican senators have already signed on as co-sponsors, including Republican power brokers like Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Mitch McConnell (R-KY), as well as moderates like Susan Collins (R-ME) and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK). At least one other Republican senator, Rand Paul (R-KY), would probably support the bill as well, since he introduced his own bill last week that wouldn’t allow any presidential tariffs to take effect without congressional approval, even for 60 days.

Assuming every Democrat would support it, that would bring the bill up to 55 votes, just shy of the 60-vote supermajority needed to break a filibuster. However, the Senate floor schedule is generally set by Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD), who is unlikely to schedule the bill for a vote.

A companion bill has been introduced in the House by Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE), who has already picked up one Republican co-sponsor; per Axios, at least a dozen more are considering signing on. In the House, lawmakers can force a vote on any piece of legislation if 218 members (a simple majority) sign a discharge petition; if every Democrat except pro-tariff Rep. Jared Golden (D-ME) were to sign on, it would require eight Republicans to join.

Bacon has said he may end up supporting a discharge petition, but that he isn’t ready to do so yet. The discharge petition process takes several weeks to work through; even if one were to suddenly generate 218 signatures tomorrow, it would still take until around June for a vote on the bill to take place.

The White House has already issued a formal veto threat against the Trade Review Act, an unusual step for a bill that hasn’t been scheduled for a floor vote — and likely an attempt to pressure any more Republicans against announcing their support. A presidential veto can only be overridden by a two-thirds votes in both chambers of Congress, which would require support from 20 Republican senators and 77 House Republicans (again, assuming complete Democratic support minus Golden).

1b. Congress ends the new tariffs specifically. Trump’s new tariffs were imposed by invoking the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), which allows the president to regulate “importation or exportation” if he declares a national emergency. Trump declared that the “lack of reciprocity in our bilateral trade relationships” posed an “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and economy of the United States,” which rose to the level of national emergency.

Under the National Emergencies Act (NEA), however, any national emergency declared by a president can be overturned by Congress. Any related presidential action, including the tariffs, would then be rescinded as a result.

A resolution ending a national emergency can still be vetoed, so the same veto-proof majority would be required. But, notably, it’s much easier for this type of legislation to receive a floor vote. Under the NEA, any resolution ending a national emergency is privileged, which means a single senator or representative can force a vote in either chamber. Such resolutions are also filibuster-proof in the Senate.

A group of Democratic senators, plus Paul, introduced a resolution on Tuesday that would rescind Trump’s trade deficit emergency, ending the new tariffs. A companion measure has also been initiated in the House. In 18 calendar days, these lawmakers will be able to force votes in both chambers, putting all members of Congress on the record about the new tariffs.

Senate Democrats used the same procedure to force a vote last week on Trump’s Canada tariffs; the resolution was approved 51-48, with support from Paul, McConnell, Collins, and Murkowksi. As faithful readers will recall, House Republicans have paused time to prevent Democrats from forcing a vote on that resolution in the House; however, that provision does not apply to any resolution relating to the new national emergency.

2. Courts strikes down the tariffs

The first lawsuit has already been filed against Trump’s new tariffs, by the conservative New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA) on behalf of Simplified, a Florida-based home goods company that relies on imports from China. (As a sidenote: the NCLA has received funding in the past from Republican megadonor Charles Koch and Federalist Society leader Leonard Leo, a Trump ally.)

More legal challenges are likely to follow, including potentially from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. But let’s stick with the NCLA lawsuit for a moment, and walk through the two major pathways it articulates for courts to invalidate the tariffs:

2a. Courts invoke the Major Questions Doctrine. The major questions doctrine is a legal principle that circulated in conservative circles for several decades before eventually receiving the imprimatur of the Supreme Court in 2022.

In West Virginia v. EPA that year, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that on certain major questions of “economic and political significance,” executive action can only be taken if Congress has provided “clear” authorization. Absent such authorization, the doctrine says, it should be Congress, not the executive, setting policy in these areas.

Recall that the IEEPA, the law Trump is using here, refers to regulating “importation and exportation”; it does not explicitly mention tariffs. The lawsuit alleges that language does not meet the bar of a “clear” authorization from Congress, and therefore Trump has overstepped his powers under the major questions doctrine.

No president until Trump had used the IEEPA to impose tariffs. That pre-2025 history is consistent with the IEEPA’s text,” the lawsuit says, “because the text does not authorize a president to require Americans to pay tariffs.”

What’s more, the lawsuit notes, the IEEPA only empowers the president to take “necessary” actions to address a national emergency. The NCLA goes on to allege that even if the IEEPA authorizes tariffs in some cases (“which it does not,” the group hastens to add), Trump has not shown why his tariffs fit the standard of necessity.

“If the President is permitted to use the IEEPA to bypass the statutory scheme for tariffs, the President will have nearly unlimited authority to commandeer Congress’s power over tariffs,” the lawsuit argues. “He would be empowered to declare a national emergency based on some long-running national problem, then impose tariffs purportedly in the name of that emergency—thus sidestepping the detailed constraints Congress has placed on the tariff authority it has granted.”

2b. Courts invoke the Nondelegation Doctrine. What if the courts say that the IEEPA does, in fact, allow the president to impose tariffs? In that case, the lawsuit tries a different tack: claiming that the IEEPA would then be unconstitutional.

Here, the group uses a different legal theory, known as nondelegation doctrine. The doctrine says that there are certain powers the Constitution accords to Congress that Congress cannot give to the executive. The argument here would be that tariffs fall under that category.

If the IEEPA authorizes tariffs, the lawsuit says, then the “IEEPA is unconstitutional because it transfers core legislative powers to the President by permitting him to set tariffs and regulate commerce with foreign nations.” If courts were to endorse this argument, they would effectively be mandating Congress to take back their tariff powers, even if lawmakers don’t want to do it themselves.

Obviously, even if a district court endorses either the Major Questions or Nondelegation argument, the case would eventually find its way up to the Supreme Court, which would have to uphold these theories, too. The Roberts Court has cited the major questions doctrine in the past, although that doesn’t mean the justices would have to rule that Trump’s use of the IEEPA would qualify.

The nondelegation doctrine, on the other hand, the justices seemed skeptical of invoking as recently as last month, which might make such a ruling unlikely.

3. Trump backs down

And now we’ve arrived at the most likely way the tariffs would come to an end: Trump ending them.

All week, we’ve received mixed signals from the White House about whether the president is open to negotiating new trade deals with other countries and lifting their tariffs in return.

“This is not a negotiation,” White House trade adviser Peter Navarro — the architect of Trump’s tariff strategy — wrote in a Financial Times op-ed on Monday.

By Tuesday, the message (or, more accurately, the messenger) shifted. “I think you’re going to see a couple of big trading partners do deals very quickly,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told reporters, signaling that the tariffs may soon be lifted as new agreements are inked.

Trump himself has offered little clarity. “It can both be true,” he said Monday. “There can be permanent tariffs, and there can also be negotiations.” So, that clears things up.

The pathways for either Congress or Trump to end the tariffs both ultimately hinge on their respective pain tolerance. How economically and politically painful do the tariffs have to be for Republican lawmakers to decide that the electoral risk of standing by Trump is greater than the risk of breaking with him?

And how unpopular do they have to be for Trump to start looking for an exit ramp, a way to prematurely declare victory and put the sage behind him?

So far, Trump seems determined to charge ahead — “BE COOL! Everything is going to work out well,” he wrote on Truth Social this morning — and appears to have sufficient Republican backing to survive any congressional challenges. But as the weeks roll on, if the tariffs create the financial tailspin that some economists are predicting, that calculus could start to shift.

In the meantime, investors are clinging to any sign of hope they can get — even questionable headlines — perhaps because all of the real escape routes from the tariffs are littered with complications.