Devin Sikes Quoted in Law360 on Supreme Court’s Refusal to Hear Steel Tariff Case

Akin Gump international trade counsel Devin Sikes has been quoted in the Law360 article “High Court Won’t Touch Trump’s Security Tariffs.” The article examines the Supreme Court’s decision to turn down a request by a steel importer group to overturn sweeping tariffs imposed by President Trump.

Law360 reports that the American Institute for International Steel had hoped to knock down Mr. Trump’s use of Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 to restrict steel and aluminum imports, arguing that the law improperly gave up congressional authority over trade to the executive branch. The justices denied the petition without explanation.

Sikes said the decision was not surprising given that the Court has been increasingly wary to address issues of national security. “It’s just not an area that the Supreme Court generally in the last couple decades has wanted to touch,” he said.

The article reports that the government argued there was no need to examine Section 232, as the law already received a nondelegation blessing in the 1976 case Federal Energy Administration v. Algonquin. If the government had asked the justices to review the matter, Sikes said, they probably would have taken the case and relied heavily on Algonquin in their decision-making.

Sikes added that the decision not to hear this case is unlikely to affect the outcome of other cases that involve “different legal challenges” to the way the Department of Commerce administers the exclusion process and Mr. Trump’s proclamation on steel and aluminum derivatives.