Trump Administration Considers 15% Tariffs for 150 Days as Legal Backup Plan

President Trump's trade staff is said to be working on an alternative plan to implement the president's steep tariffs after recent court rulings.

The administration is considering a temporary option to impose tariffs on large parts of the worldwide economy under an existing law that authorizes tariffs of up to 15% for 150 days, sources told The Wall Street Journal on Thursday.

The government has not made a final decision and might decide to forgo taking any action at all, the report added.

This is a day after a federal appeals court issued a temporary stay, permitting the tariffs to stand in spite of a trade court ruling that had called for them to be suspended immediately.

The WSJ report explains that US officials are contemplating a "twofold response" if they must find a new legal basis for imposing the president's dramatic tariffs, which Trump insists will again make America's trade balances fair. Sources said the first option is to invoke a little-used clause of the Trade Act of 1974 to apply tariffs to significant segments of the global market.

This provision contains language that will permit tariffs of up to 15% for 150 days to balance trade with other nations," the sources said to WSJ.

This methodology would offer temporary protection, allowing the administration to work on country-specific tariffs for each major trading partner under a distinct provision of law. The second part is said to entail a lengthy public notice and comment procedure, but this is perceived by officials as having a sounder legal basis than the tariff policy that was recently ruled illegal.

The report further indicated that the alternative legal authority has previously been used several times before, such as for Trump's tariffs imposed on China in his first term.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, on Thursday, confirmed that the administration is considering other tariff options while appealing the court decisions, but she failed to give more details.

On Monday, a three-judge panel from the US Court of International Trade decided that Trump overstepped his authority by using the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act to declare a national emergency and impose tariffs on imports from almost every country in the world.

However, Trump's trade wars are far from over. On Thursday, the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals allowed the president to continue temporarily collecting tariffs under the emergency powers law while he appeals the trade court's decision.