Historic Supreme Courts--Tariffs, Episode 7: Rehnquist’s Ruling: Why Trump’s Tariffs Would Hold

Think of the Rehnquist Court as the kind of court that points an accusatory finger at Congress, not the president. They’d probably uphold Trump’s tariffs because Congress explicitly gave the president broad trade and national-security power, and the Court didn’t want to become the policy police.

So it’s less a drama about tyranny and more a structural shrug: Congress made the rules and then ducked responsibility, and the Court would say that cleanup is Congress’s job, not the judiciary’s.