Section 301 Tariff to Bite Hard as Supreme Court Refuses to Intervene

[ABS News Service/18.06.2026]

The US Supreme Court declined yesterday to hear a challenge to the tariffs President Trump imposed on China during his first Administration.

The high court said it will not review a lower court decision upholding the Section 301 tariffs that were placed on an array of Chinese products in 2018 during his first term in office.

Opponents of the tariffs – HMTX Industries and other flooring and electronics companies – challenged the Section 301 tariffs.

Specifically, they argued that the law did not give the President the authority to modify the tariffs by increasing them from originally covering $50 billion worth of Chinese products to some $370 billion. By increasing the tariffs, the Administration essentially launched a trade war with China, which retaliated with its own tariffs against US products.

An appeals court rejected that argument, saying that the Section 301 law does allow changes to the tariffs. That ruling was appealed by the plaintiffs. But the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal.