Common Sense with Paul Jacob

As of September, Scott Lincicome and Alfredo Carrillo Obregon write, “more than half of all US imports (by value) were subject to one or more special tariff measures (i.e., classified in Chapter 99 of the Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States) and to the associated bureaucracy.”

Though there has been legal action against Donald Trump’s diktat-approach to tariff policy, the Cato authors don’t put much hope in these challenges. “Regardless of what the Supreme Court does with Trump’s ‘emergency’ tariffs, moreover, US tariff red tape will likely grow more this year, burdening US companies and the economy in the process.”

And growing red tape is a drag on economic growth. It is a prime strangler of growth.

But there is more than one challenge to Trump’s tariff mania. They’re not all equally feckless, are they?

The Supreme Court’s forthcoming decision in the Learning Resources Inc. et al. v. Trump case could significantly reduce the complexity of the US tariff system if the Court invalidates the Trump administration’s IEEPA tariffs. Such reprieve, however, would likely be temporary because the Trump administration has pledged to replicate the IEEPA regime through other executive tariff authorities, including through both Sections 232 and 301 measures, and previously unused statutes such as Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1934 and Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930. (Though, such authorities arguably have more built-in procedural and/​or substantive checks than IEEPA does.) This system, in fact, might be even more complex than what we have right now.

It will therefore remain the case that a true reduction in tariff red tape will only be accomplished through congressional action to revise various US trade laws and reclaim the legislative branch’s constitutional authority over tariffs.

This needless complexity all comes back to Congress, which could fix it, but chooses not to. A familiar problem.

Also all-too-familiar is fundamental confusion about tariffs. For some reason, Americans don’t think of tariffs as taxes. But tariffs are just another form of taxation, of course, no matter what is popularly believed. And can anything show how far from the Reagan Revolution the Trumpian movement is than seeing Republicans rally around an enthusiastic taxer?

Is it the worst initialism ever? “Operation Parris — Post-Admission Refugee Reverification and Integrity Strengthening — will focus first on Minnesota’s 5,600 refugees who have not yet been given lawful status,” explains The Epoch Times in a Friday article.

“The operation will conduct thorough background checks, reinterview applicants for green cards, and explore merit reviews of the current refugee claims,” the article by Savannah Hulsey Pointer continues. 

What’s at stake are billions in fraud. “Last month, a federal prosecutor suggested that more than half of the roughly $18 billion in federal funds supporting 14 programs in Minnesota since 2018 may have been stolen.”

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump is expanding the scope of investigation into subsidies to individuals and families, saying “on Jan. 6 that California would be the next target. . . . The president alleged on social media that the Golden State could have more fraud than Minnesota.”

And in Congress, at Wednesday’s House Oversight Committee hearing on the subject, Rep. Brandon Gill (R-TX) grilled Democrats’ witness Brendan Ballou, former Special Counsel at the DOJ, beginning with the ideologically based challenge, “does large-scale Somali immigration make Minnesota stronger or weaker?” The answer was “yes,” but further questions and answers didn’t make Mr. Ballou look so good. It’s mainly been shared for yucks.