(WASHINGTON) — The Supreme Court on Friday delivered a major blow to President Donald Trump by invalidating most of global tariffs, a cornerstone of his economic policy in his second term.
In a 6-3 decision, written by Chief Justice John Roberts, the court deemed that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) does not give Trump the power to unilaterally impose tariffs.
“We claim no special competence in matters of economics or foreign affairs. We claim only, as we must, the limited role assigned to us by Article III of the Constitution,” Roberts wrote. “Fulfilling that role, we hold that IEEPA does not authorize the President to impose tariffs.”
The Trump administration attempted to justify the tariffs by arguing that IEEPA says the president has the power to regulate “importation,” but Roberts said their read of the law was a stretch.
“Based on two words separated by 16 others in Section 1702(a)(1)(B) of IEEPA—‘regulate’ and ‘importation’—the President asserts the independent power to impose tariffs on imports from any country, of any product, at any rate, for any amount of time,” Roberts wrote. “Those words cannot bear such weight.”
Roberts said the court was highly skeptical of the claim that Congress had delegated to the president a “birth-right power to tax” though the passage of the 1977 law. Congress, not the president, has the power to impose tariffs and taxes, the majority concluded.
“The Framers did not vest any part of the taxing power in the Executive Branch,” the ruling said.
Justices Clarence Thomas, Brett Kavanaugh and Samuel Alito dissented from the majority, arguing that Trump should have the power to impose tariffs during national emergencies.
“The tariffs at issue here may or may not be wise policy. But as a matter of text, history, and precedent, they are clearly lawful,” Kavanaugh wrote.
Trump had publicly lobbied for months for the court to rule in his favor, including in remarks he delivered on Thursday about in Georgia. Trump, speaking on the economy, said “without tariffs, this country would be in such trouble right now.”
The White House has said it is prepared to present alternative avenues for imposing the tariffs under different legal authorities.
The Supreme Court’s ruling strikes down 70% of Trump’s global tariffs after they have collected more than $142 billion through December, according to the Yale Budget Lab.
While the Supreme Court rejected President Trump’s sweeping tariff power under IEEPA, the tariffs Trump imposed using Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 — such as tariffs on steel and aluminum — remain in place. Trump has also suggested in the past that he might attempt to reframe the tariffs as “licenses,” though such a move would likely be challenged in court.
Companies ranging from Costco to small businesses have sued the Trump administration to effectively “get in line” for refunds if the court deemed them unconstitutional.
The court’s majority did not explicitly address the issue of refunds or how that process would work.
Kavanaugh noted such in his dissent.
“Refunds of billions of dollars would have significant consequences for the U.S. Treasury. The Court says nothing today about whether, and if so how, the Government should go about returning the billions of dollars that it has collected from importers. But that process is likely to be a ‘mess,’ as was acknowledged at oral argument,” Kavanaugh wrote.
ABC News’ Elizabeth Schulze and Zunaira Zaki contributed to this report.
: Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz speaks to media gathered on the first day of school at Deerwood Elementary on September 2, 2025 in Eagan, Minnesota. (Photo by Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, a Democrat, announced Monday that he would drop his bid for reelection as governor, saying that he would not be able to give a campaign all of his attention as he works to defend Minnesota against allegations of fraud and right-wing attacks — including from President Donald Trump.
“In September, I announced that I would run for a historic third term as Minnesota’s Governor. And I have every confidence that, if I gave it my all, I would succeed in that effort,” Walz wrote in a statement Monday.
“But as I reflected on this moment with my family and my team over the holidays, I came to the conclusion that I can’t give a political campaign my all. Every minute I spend defending my own political interests would be a minute I can’t spend defending the people of Minnesota against the criminals who prey on our generosity and the cynics who prey on our differences.”
Walz, who served as Vice President Kamala Harris’ running mate in 2024, had come under fire in recent weeks amid allegations of fraud in child-care centers in Minnesota. Walz had said the state was investigating alleged fraud and slammed how rhetoric targeting the state’s Somali community about the allegations could put people at risk.
“I know this news may come as a surprise. But I’m passing on the race with zero sadness and zero regret. After all, I didn’t run for this job so I could have this job. I ran for this job so I could do this job. Minnesota faces an enormous challenge this year. And I refuse to spend even one minute of 2026 doing anything other than rising to meet the moment. Minnesota has to come first — always,” Walz wrote.
Walz was the subject of Trump’s frequent criticism — with the president claiming he was “a Crooked Governor” in a recent social media post.
Walz would have made history if he won the governorship in 2026, as previously no Minnesota governor has won a third consecutive four-year term.
His exit from the race currently leaves Democrats without a major candidate in the race, although other major names may be set to jump in soon.
Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar met with Walz over the weekend about a possible bid for governor, according to two sources familiar with the meeting.
This comes as a source close to Klobuchar tells ABC News that she’s been getting a lot of outreach encouraging her to run. She is considering the bid, according to the source, but hasn’t made a final decision.
Representatives for Klobuchar, who won reelection to the Senate in 2024, did not immediately respond to ABC News’ requests for comment.
The Democratic Governors Association, the arm of the Democratic Party focused on electing Democratic governors, released a statement on Monday praising Walz for his work without endorsing any other potential candidates.
“No matter who decides to run or how much national Republicans want to spend, the DGA remains very confident Minnesotans will elect another strong Democratic governor this November,” DGA chair and Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear wrote in a statement.
On the Republican side, longtime Trump loyalist and CEO of MyPillow Mike Lindell announced in December that he is running for governor of Minnesota. Lindell has already been endorsed by Trump.
Walz also has been viewed as a potential 2028 presidential hopeful, and visited a few key presidential battleground states in 2025, although he has previously downplayed the prospect of running for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Walz, in his statement announcing he would not seek reelection, had harsh words for Trump and Republicans who have excoriated the state for alleged child-care fraud and said that it occurred on Walz’s watch.
“I won’t mince words here,” Walz wrote. “Donald Trump and his allies — in Washington, in St. Paul, and online — want to make our state a colder, meaner place.”
Saying that the state government had taken steps to investigate fraud, and continues to work on combating it, Walz said Minnesota “will win the fight against the fraudsters. But the political gamesmanship we’re seeing from Republicans is only making that fight harder to win.”
Republicans celebrated Walz’s announcement on Monday. House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, a Republican representing Minnesota, wrote in a short statement reacting to Walz’s announcement, “Good riddance.”
“It’s been failure after failure for Tim Walz, so it’s no surprise he chickened out of running for re-election,” Republican National Committee Regional Communications Director Delanie Bomar wrote in a separate statement on Monday.
Minnesota has been under scrutiny in recent weeks over yearslong investigations and controversies about alleged fraud in child-care centers.
According to federal charges filed over the past couple of years, at least 70 people were part of a wide-ranging criminal conspiracy that exploited two federally funded nutrition programs to fraudulently obtain more than $250 million in one of the largest COVID-era fraud schemes anywhere in the nation.
The defendants allegedly used a Minnesota-based nonprofit organization called Feeding Our Future to avoid tough scrutiny from the Minnesota Department of Education, which was supposed to be conducting oversight of the programs.
More scrutiny came recently after an unverified online video from conservative influencer Nick Shirley alleging fraud in child care in Somali communities in Minneapolis. Minnesota officials have disputed the allegations. During more recent site checks, officials said locations highlighted by the video were operating as expected.
Last week, an official with the Department of Health and Human Services said that the Trump administration is pausing child-care funding to all states after the Minnesota allegations emerged. The official said the funds will be released “only when states prove they are being spent legitimately.”
“Republicans are playing politics with the future of our state,” Walz said in his statement on Monday. “And it’s shameful.”
ABC News’ Benjamin Siegel, Isabella Murray, Laura Romero and Mike Levine contributed to this report.
Donald Trump delivers remarks during a working breakfast with governors in the State Dining Room at the White House on February 20, 2026 in Washington, DC. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — When President Donald Trump delivers the first State of the Union address of his second term Tuesday night — it will be a chance to make the case for his sweeping policy goals directly to millions of Americans — ahead of November’s midterm elections where control of Congress is at stake.
One year ago, Trump proclaimed “America is back” as he addressed a joint session of Congress shortly after taking office, laying out novel plans to make good on issues he campaigned on, including lowering prices while imposing worldwide tariffs, the mass deportations of immigrants in the country illegally, and a promise to keep America out of foreign wars.
Since then, he has taken unprecedented, often highly controversial, steps to reshape the federal government and achieve those goals, testing the limits of presidential power on both the domestic and foreign policy fronts. But he’s done so at a political cost – with polls showing a growing number of Americans displeased or opposed.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Tuesday morning that the president will contend that he and Republicans are the best choice to “continue tackling the affordability crisis” and that he’ll feature a Pennsylvania waitress who benefitted from his “no tax on tips” policy.
Earlier, she posted on X that “In one year, President Trump has turned our country around from the brink of disaster, and he will rightly declare the State of Our Union is strong, prosperous and respected.”
He could also use his speech to shore up support from lawmakers and the American people on two major, immediate issues: the current showdown with Iran that could end up with Trump ordering the U.S. military into war — and his tariff policy — much of which was struck down as illegal last week by the Supreme Court.
At least some of the justices are expected to attend, possibly including the conservatives ones he picked and who joined in that ruling. By tradition, they will be seated just in front of him, and the presence of justices he has railed against, even personally attacked, could bring fireworks to the House chamber.
The economy and tariffs
After months of blaming former President Joe Biden for leaving what he repeatedly called an economic “mess,” Trump has now taken full responsibility for the economy, even declaring last week that he “won affordability.” While he is sure to tout the relative taming of inflation in recent months – down to 2.4% now from 3% when he took office – that hasn’t translated into lower prices across the board for many Americans.
Prices for some key household goods such as eggs and gas are down, but his tariffs and other factors have increased the prices of many household goods such as produce, beef and coffee.
The ABC News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll shows that almost half of Americans, 48%, say the economy has gotten worse since Trump took office — although that number is down slightly from 52%, who said the same in October.
Given that, he faces an uphill battle to persuade Americans they are better off. According to that recent ABC/Post/Ipsos poll, 65% of Americans disapprove of how Trump is handling inflation and 57% disapprove of how he’s handling the economy overall.
“We have the greatest economy we’ve ever had,” Trump said Monday. “We have the most activity we’ve ever had. I’m making a speech tomorrow night, and you’ll be hearing me say that. I mean it’s — it’s going to be a long speech because we have so much to talk about.”
As Democrats make the rising cost of health care a major message for their candidates to run on in this fall – after many Americans saw their premiums skyrocket when Affordable Care Act subsidies expired at the start of the year – Trump will likely need to counter that by citing what he says he’s done to make health care more affordable.
He will surely point to his Most Favored Nation policy that lowered the cost of some pharmaceuticals and the TrumpRx platform aimed at making those lower prices for some medications more transparent.
Foreign policy
Trump will also have the chance to make the case for some of the ambitious foreign policy moves he’s made during his first year in office. His reshaping of America’s role in the global order comes as even some Republicans have criticized Trump for focusing too much on foreign policy rather than on domestic issues.
At his orders, the U.S. has amassed a major military force near Iran as negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program between American and Iranian officials are likely to continue on Thursday. Even so, critics say Trump and his administration have not made publicly clear exactly what objectives they are seeking in Iran.
At the same time, he has made clear the possibility of military action — either limited or more prolonged — is not out of the question, even as polls show Americans are hesitant about the U.S. getting involved in another war to make changes in another country.
More than half of Americans, 54%, oppose Trump using the U.S. military to force changes in other countries, while only 20% support it (and 26% say they have no opinion or did not respond to the question), according to the ABC/Post/Ipsos poll.
Trump will also have the chance to lay out his view that America has supremacy over the Western Hemisphere, what he has coined the “Don-roe Doctrine.”
That view was evident in the military operation that put American boots on the ground in Venezuela to capture then-President Nicolas Maduro and the ongoing strikes he’s authorized on boats allegedly carrying drugs in the Caribbean and Pacific that have killed more than 150 people.
That ideology was also a cornerstone in his repeated calls for the U.S. to “own” Greenland, something that alarmed many of America’s closest European allies. The president said that a deal with Denmark was in the works for ownership of the territory during his trip to Switzerland in January, but since then no other information has come from the White House about the status of those talks.
Immigration
The president will also likely tout success on the border and immigration, even as some public opinion has turned on the tactics used by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the immigration crackdown he’s ordered.
The Department of Homeland Security said in December that 2.5 million undocumented migrants were removed from the U.S. and the president has celebrated the reduction in crossings as the southern border, both of which were major campaign promises.
However, as ICE operations have ramped up, public opinion has started turning against them in the wake of the killings of Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti in Minnesota by federal law enforcement.
The ABC/Post/Ipsos poll found that the president’s approval ratings on immigration are also at a low for his second term — with 58% disapproving of his handling of immigration and 40% approving.
ABC News’ Fritz Farrow contributed to this report.
U.S. President Donald Trump addresses the nation from the Diplomatic Room of the White House on December 17, 2025 in Washington, DC. White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump would be “addressing the country about all of his historic accomplishments over the past year, and maybe teasing some policy that will be coming in the new year, as well.” (Photo by Doug Mills – Pool/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — The White House announced Thursday that the board at the Kennedy Center, which President Donald Trump now chairs and is newly filled with his appointees, has voted “unanimously” to rename the building the “Trump-Kennedy Center.”
“I have just been informed that the highly respected Board of the Kennedy Center, some of the most successful people from all parts of the world, have just voted unanimously to rename the Kennedy Center to the Trump-Kennedy Center, because of the unbelievable work President Trump has done over the last year in saving the building,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote in a social media post.
“Not only from the standpoint of its reconstruction, but also financially, and its reputation. Congratulations to President Donald J. Trump, and likewise, congratulations to President Kennedy, because this will be a truly great team long into the future! The building will no doubt attain new levels of success and grandeur,” Leavitt continued.
The move raises legal questions, as it appears congressional approval would be needed to make the name change.
David Super, a professor at Georgetown Law, told ABC News that federal statute (Title 20 of the U.S. Code, section 76i) designates the building “the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.”
“I suppose he could rename some parts of the building, but he cannot rename the building itself or the center itself,” Super said.
Back in February, Trump fired multiple members from the Kennedy Center’s Board of Trustees and became its chairman. Several of his administration officials were then installed as board members — including White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, second lady Usha Vance, deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino, and U.S. Ambassador to India Sergio Gor.
When asked about the board’s vote to rename the center during an executive order signing in the Oval Office on Thursday, Trump said he was “honored” and “surprised.”
“Well, I was honored by it. It’s board, it’s a very distinguished board, most distinguished people in the country. And I was surprised by it. I was honored by it,” Trump said.
While Trump and the White House said the vote was unanimous, Democratic Rep. Joyce Beatty, who sits on the Kennedy Board of Trustees as one of its ex-officio members, said she was muted on the call during the vote and could not voice her opposition to the name change.
Beatty told reporters that “a lot of time was spent praising the president” before a proposal was made to rename the building.
“At that point, I said, ‘I have something to say,’ and I was muted, and as I continued to try to unmute, to ask questions and voice my opposition to this, I received a note saying that I would not be unmuted,” Beatty said. “I was not allowed to vote because I was muted. I would not have supported this.”
Beatty and Democratic Rep. Chellie Pingree, the ranking member on the House Appropriations subcommittee on the interior, said they were looking at ways to push back on the change in Congress.
“We also believe this is illegal. This is our living monument to JFK,” Pingree said.
Though Trump said he was “surprised,” he has repeatedly referred to the center as the “Trump-Kennedy Center” before the change was announced on Thursday.
“On Dec. 5 of this year, the 2026 FIFA World Cup draw will take place at the Kennedy Center. Some people refer to [it] as the Trump-Kennedy Center, but we’re not prepared to do that quite yet– maybe in a week or so,” Trump said on August 22.
Trump on Thursday said his administration “saved” the historic arts and culture center.
“We’re saving the building. We saved the building. The building was in such bad shape — physically, financially, in every other way,” he said. “And now it’s very solid and very strong.”
Despite Leavitt and Trump’s claims that he has rescued the building financially, the Washington Post reported in late October that ticket sales have plummeted since Trump’s takeover.
Several high-profile artists and shows have canceled appearances at the venue since Trump became its leader, including actress Issa Rae and the Broadway show “Hamilton.”
ABC News’ John Parkinson contributed to this report.
