Chaos, Confusion and Defiance: The Global Fallout From the Tariff Ruling

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From the New York Times, I'm Natalie Kitroweff. This is the Daily. In the wake of the monumental Supreme Court ruling striking down President Trump's tariffs, the entire world is scrambling to understand what comes next. Will countries back away from the massive deals they made with Trump? Will companies get refunds for the billions they already spent on tariffs? And will Trump actually be constrained by any of this? Today, my colleagues Tyler Pager, Ana Swanson and Andrew Ross Sorkin explain. It's Monday, february 23rd. Tyler, you cover the White House. Andrew, you cover corporate America. Ana, you cover trade. Thank you all for joining me on this Sunday afternoon.

0:33

Thanks so much, Natalie.

1:36

Thanks for having us.

1:37

Yeah, glad to be here.

1:38

So, to catch us up from where we left things on Friday with the massive news that the Supreme Court had invalidated most of the administration's tariffs, we saw Trump respond first by putting in place a new 10% tariff on imports across the board and then jacking it up to 15% over the weekend. We're gonna get into the specifics of that today. But just to start, what have the reactions been in the worlds that you all cover? Tyler, I wanna start with you. Take us inside the reaction from the

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White House on Friday morning. The President was speaking to a group of governors in the East Room of the White House when Jamison Greer, the trade representative, handed him a note alerting him to the Supreme Court's decision. The President told the governors it was a disgrace. He la, Lashed out at the Supreme Court and quickly wrapped up that meeting and left. And he was irate. He met with advisors and then we saw that full blown anger on display in the White House briefing room a few hours later. And for Trump, this wasn't just a political loss, but a personal one, too. He has been obsessed with tariffs as an economic tool for decades, long before his political career. And so this felt like a real personal loss to something he deeply believes in.

2:10

And Ana, how has the international community responded?

2:58

So, obviously this had been somewhat expected for other countries that were following the Supreme Court ruling, but it has still caused a lot of immediate doubt and confusion with countries that have been agonizing about these tariffs all year. So you had countries that had just finalized their trade deal the day before. Now the underlying terms of trade, the tariffs that those deals are based on, are gone and replaced with something entirely different. And some of those countries have made concessions that are controversial with their own people. So this has just introduced a lot of uncertainty for the months to come.

3:02

And Andrew, what about the corporate world?

3:39

The Trump administration's tariff effort is probably the most significant shift in global trade in decades and really is the most important sort of rethink about how the United States trades with other countries, how US Corporations operate in other countries, how international companies operate in our countries. I mean, it is everything. I spent the weekend talking to business leaders and CEOs, many of whom really have re scrambled their entire supply chains over the last six months, made commitments to bring manufacturing back to the United States, switched manufacturing plants from places like China to India to other places, thought that they had remapped what their true costs were going to be, and are now looking at this saying, oh my goodness, what comes next? I think all of these companies are spending the weekend trying to think through all of this with a sense, though, that this is going to be a very long term fight, whatever it is.

3:43

Okay, so there's a lot of confusion with companies and countries trying to sort out what all this uncertainty means for them. Tyler, the administration has obviously been preparing for this moment for a while. It's been clear that the Supreme Court was skeptical of these tariffs long before the actual ruling. But the response from the White House has still seemed pretty chaotic. First the 10%, then the 15%. Do we have any idea what's behind that sense of chaos?

4:51

Yeah, it was quite a whiplash over just less than 24 hours where the President came out to the briefing room and announced these 10% tariffs. Later that evening, Friday, he signed the official paperwork instituting those 10% tariffs. And then Saturday morning, he announces this 15% tariff on social media. And what I will tell you, Natalie, is that many of the President's advisers and people close to the White House were surprised and taken aback by the rapid change from 10 to 15%. Some have speculated that the President was frustrated by the media coverage of his loss at the Supreme Court and wanted to show that he still had power to raise tariffs even more. But we have not heard from the President since then about precisely why he made this change less than 24 hours later.

5:23

I do think there's an important point there. Just to jump in. So, you know, some people had speculated earlier that maybe they would save that extra 5% increase and use it as leverage or negotiation later. But at 15%, the rate does get you close to what it was overall before. So at 10%, it was a little bit lower than the rate had been previously. Now it's like pretty close. So within an average percentage point of what it was before, of course, this one is flat, whereas the previous rate varied a lot by country. So there are huge differences for different countries.

6:14

Right, right. And just to jump off that, I want to understand, Ana, what you've been reporting on, which is the options that the administration is pursuing now outside of just the 15% tariff. Can you ground us here, give us a kind of sober explanation of what the administration has in store for us?

6:53

Yeah, absolutely. So there was always a Plan B, because before Plan A, the president was presented with this menu of options for his tariffs, and he had chosen this International Emergency Economics Powers act because it was the most flexible. It allowed him to raise and lower tariffs at a whim. But he always had a lot of other options. And in fact, you know, some of his advisors preferred those other options because they were less vulnerable to a court challenge.

7:15

Right.

7:43

So now he's kind of going back to those that original playbook. Right. And so there are a few different authorities. One important one is called Section 301. It's run by the Office of the United States Trade Representative. They'll carry out investigations into unfair trade practices and can levy tariffs that way. It's what the president used against China in his first term. He also has another called Section 232, which allows for tariffs on the basis of national security. And there are a lot of tariffs that have been levied that way as well. So the administration has put in place this 15% tariff for now. That's a flat rate for the world. Those tariffs expire in five months. And if Trump wants to extend them, he needs the approval of Congress, which seems pretty unlikely at this point, given that midterms are coming up and voters are concerned about affordability and tariffs adding to costs.

7:44

And just to say the midterms and the fact that the tariffs largely aren't actually popular with voters, that's actually part of the calculus for the business community as they consider their plans, because they're looking at all these tariffs and they're wondering, given the politics of this moment, are these tariffs still going to be here in six months? Because in truth, the view is that if These tariffs are not going to exist come this fall. The whole game gets re scrambled. It changes completely all over again. And so it's gonna be very interesting to see whether companies tip their hand and really tell us what they're gonna do, whether they're gonna be willing to really talk about what their plans are next as they're making them.

8:43

And Andrew makes a great point because this is of utmost importance to the President himself. I was just with the President in Georgia on Thursday where he was touting these various business executives who told him that they were moving manufacturing or expanding manufacturing in the United States because of his tariffs. This is of personal pride to the President. So if companies are changing their plans or making new plans, they run the risk of some sort of retribution campaign from the President, who feels extremely proud of the impact he believes tariffs are having in reshaping the American economy and reviving the manufacturing sector.

9:27

Okay, Andrew, I want to talk about what the future may hold for these companies, but I have to ask. It seems as though the corporate world that you cover has been really focused on the question of what this decision means, about the tariffs they've already paid, about the past, whether and how they might get refunds on the billions in costs they've already racked up. But what do we know about that?

10:08

So look, you, you can look at companies like Toyota, which recently attributed about $8 billion of losses to the tariffs. Ford said that the tariff related charges cost them $2 billion in 2025. They're expecting over $1 billion in 2026. General Motors is in somewhat of a similar camp. So there are a lot of businesses that have been impacted by this that they can look directly at those losses and say they want that money back. There's a real question about whether they can get that money back, how the refund process works. When you actually have to sue effectively or put in for the refund, you might need to do it relatively quickly, which also means you have to do it publicly. Again, this question of when you publicly seek a refund, what does that ultimately also mean for your business if it's regulated in some other way by the US Government? And if you're concerned at all about the administration somehow coming back at you

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in another way, retaliating, you're saying basically there may be some risk for these businesses in confronting the President on this.

11:32

You know, this administration has aggressively pursued companies in so many different ways, whether it be law firms or you can look at some of the big media companies or so many other instances where they have used their regulatory powers against corporations that they did not believe were, quote, unquote onside, if you will, with this administration. And therefore, I think there's a big question about, you know, whether some of these companies will seek refunds or not.

11:40

Ana, you regularly talk to small businesses who have been affected by the tariffs. I wonder whether they are at a disadvantage in terms of getting refunds given everything that's involved. What are you hearing?

12:06

Yeah, absolutely. So small businesses tend to have fewer resources. They can't hire the high priced lawyers, the lobbyists to come in and talk to the Trump administration.

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Administration.

12:30

And that has really made a difference in how different industries and companies have been treated over the past year. And I think one thing is that this tariff system has just added this huge amount of complexity for businesses to deal with. And that takes resources. I hear from companies all the time that instead of doing their business, they're spending time figuring out these tariffs. And so that's a big cost for companies. It's hard to describe just how complicated Trump's tariff system was before the Supreme Court ruling. There were different rates for different countries, different products. Now that is all gone. It's replaced with an entirely, very different set system of tariffs. There's a 150 day clock running on that with big questions about what is going to replace it. And all that uncertainty is just, it's bad for investment. I mean, companies are not going to want to invest billions of dollars in a factory. That will take years to. If tariff policy is gonna change dramatically in the next few months, okay, we're

12:30

gonna get to those bigger implications. Andrew, I have what may seem like a technical question for you. We talked on the show before about the questions surrounding who was actually paying for the tariffs. Were the companies eating the cost or were they passing it on to consumers? If the companies raised prices because of tariffs and can they actually legitimately get refunds?

13:33

You are asking what may be the $175 billion question, which is to say there is an argument that may be made by this administration in court. If a company comes to seek a refund, it is possible that the administration will argue that they effectively raised prices, didn't suffer or subject themselves therefore to a loss, and therefore effectively have no standing to collect a refund.

13:59

And Tyler, how is the administration thinking about this question of companies potentially demanding massive refunds?

14:32

Natalie, they're not really seeming to think about it all that much at all. We saw Treasury Secretary Scott Pessin say he didn't think that the American people would see this Money. And the president, at his news conference on Friday, basically ignored questions about refunds. And so, even as reporters repeatedly tried to press him, he has very much quickly moved on and has started talking about new tariffs that he wants to institute. And there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of consideration about what this process may look like should companies start requesting them.

14:40

Yeah, I think it's pretty clear that they're not going to be very enthusiastic about paying that money back. The question is how cooperative they are with any eventual court order. It will really be up to the administration to set up this system for refunds. And that could be. It could be an easy process if they wanted to make it that way, or it could be kind of a nightmare for companies. Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if it's months or even years by the time this process plays out in court, by the time this system is set up and companies actually get that money in their hands.

15:15

Can I just say, part of the political decision by this administration to pursue tariffs the way he did was because of the expectation that even if they were overturned, it would be very difficult to get the refunds back.

15:48

Hmm. You're saying it was part of the design?

16:04

All of this was part of the design because by default, it forced these companies and these countries into this particular situation, some of whom have made commitments, not just commitments, but have made investments that are very hard to turn back on now.

16:07

Yeah. So essentially, you could see these tariffs as a year of a kind of corporate tax. Is that fair?

16:23

Some people would call them a corporate tax. Some people would call them a tax on consumers. The administration would call them a tax on other countries.

16:30

After the break, we look at those other countries and the global fallout from the tariff ruling. We'll be right back.

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17:02

So, Ana, I wanna talk about all the agreements that Trump has reached, all the deals he's reached with other countries, trade deals that everyone from Europe to Japan has made based on what have now been deemed illegal tariffs. Are those deals now moot?

17:32

Well, it's still kind of up in the air, so countries have agreed to major concessions over the last few months. The administration has made initial trade deals that in a lot of cases are kind of vague. But you know, still deals with dozens of countries in which they've agreed to drop tariffs, make big investments in the United States. And now the tariffs that underlie those are suddenly gone. But you already see some hesitation on the part of other countries, you know, that have agreed to these terms. So you had officials in the EU saying recently that they might pause the ratification of their trade. And the other piece of this is that this new system, this flat 15% tariff for everybody for some countries feels really, really unfair because they have made a lot of concessions to the United States in order to lower their tariff rates. Now they're right back where everybody else is. So countries like Britain and Australia were at 10%. Now they're at 15%, along with other countries like Vietnam, Indonesia, India. So a lot of people in other countries just questioning whether they should have made all these concessions to the president for tariffs that are not now in effect.

17:52

But, Ana, do these countries not have the same risks that we talked about companies having in terms of, you know, poking the bear, potentially confronting Trump? Couldn't that be dangerous for them if he responds, if he retaliates?

19:13

Yeah, absolutely. I think they do have a lot of risk when it comes to poking the bear. The president has been restrained by this Supreme Court ruling. He's not able to use that emergency power, but he has a lot of other tariff authorities, and he can still, you know, levy just incredible taxes on their imports. So a lot of countries are not backing away from their deals right away. They're very cognizant that the president has these other tariff powers that he could just whack them with if they do decide to break their agreement. The administration has also warned other countries that they will, in fact, do that. You know, sometimes it may take writing a report or it may take, you know, a few weeks or months, but he can still, you know, levy just incredible taxes on their imports. That makes a huge difference to industries in other countries that are trying to sell products to the United States.

19:28

You know, the other piece of this is the biggest country that didn't make a trade deal with the United States, which is China. You know, Trump had threatened something like 125% tariffs on China. He had put very high tariffs on China before they were ruled illegal. And now China has this much lower rate. So I wonder where that leaves us.

20:23

I think this goes back to the. The bigger issue about countries and companies playing chicken with the administration. And you could argue that China has played the best game of chicken yet because they didn't accept some kind of higher rate earlier. And they did try to slow roll and play out these negotiations as long as possible. And you heard early on that some countries had thought about approaching it that way, but there became this sort of view, especially as a couple of countries early on accepted these deals, that this was the future. That irrespective of what the Supreme Court said, that tariffs in one way or another are here to stay for some period of time that was going to sort of rewrite the global trade order.

20:45

And, Natalie, I think we're going to get a lot more on this front because the President is expected to travel to Beijing at the end of March, early April and meet with Xi Jinping. So we should expect there to be a lot more conversation about what the US China relationship looks like, particularly as it pertains to trade in the weeks ahead.

21:34

So, okay, just thinking about where all this leaves Trump on the global stage moving forward. Obviously, the President now has just lost this major source of power that he's been relying on. What the broad tariff authority had given him was leverage in dealmaking, not just on trade deals. Right. But also in his foreign policy generally. He's been achieving what he wants around the world in part by using tariffs as a cudgel to force countries to the table, to force them to give him things they want. Now, he doesn't have that. What impact does that loss of leverage have? Tyler, let's start with you.

21:55

Yeah, it's enormous. I mean, it was the centerpiece arguably, of his foreign policy. He used it often for economic reasons, but he also tried to use it to cut peace deals. We know that the President is very determined to win the Nobel Peace Prize. He repeatedly brags about how many conflicts he solved overseas. And at the core of some of those strategies was threatening tariffs on countries if they didn't, in his words, lay down their arms and stop fighting. And so it dramatically changes his negotiating position on the world stage because he's unable to, as Anna very clearly laid out, apply different tariff rates to different countries at a whim. And I think it left a lot of foreign leaders uncertain about what move they made and whether or not they could be punished by the President for whatever they might do. That uncertainty has been diminished in some ways because the President can't just unilaterally apply different tariffs to different countries on any given day.

22:36

Right. I mean, one source said to me that this takes away Trump's lightning bolt powers. So his Zeus like ability to just strike other countries with tariffs, it doesn't take away the ability to, to do tariffs at all. It just requires some planning. So I think you will continue to see the president use the threat of tariffs. It's just you won't see the rate change tomorrow.

23:38

I think it's also worth pointing out that the president, in implementing these new tariffs at 15% across the board, is using something called Section 122. And it is very possible that the way he's approaching it, even this time, is going to be brought to court all over again. Neal Katyal, who was the lawyer who brought the original case and went to the Supreme Court and argued it there successfully, now has made this point over the weekend that there's an argument potentially that the president cannot use section122 in the way that he is attempting to. And so we could be back here six months from now again in front of the Supreme Court over this, too.

24:03

That's interesting. You're saying basically that the authorities that the president is now using as an alternative may themselves be challenged. I just wanna push, though, on something which is that we're talking about the president having a weaker hand in negotiations, being more constrained. And legally, that is functionally true. Right. He can no longer just wake up one day and slap 50% tariffs on major trading partners. But I still think, though, that for a lot of people, it's just hard to believe that that's actually gonna happen. When you see Trump getting up there at his presser on Friday and essentially saying, that's not gonna work, I am gonna find ways to put tariffs in place and they're gonna be even more severe.

24:47

This is new for President Trump. Congress, controlled by Republicans, has largely gone along with everything he's wanted to do. And the Supreme Court had not limited his power in any major way before this decision. And so for the president, it's a moment where he has to reckon with the checks and balance inherent in the Constitution, that for most of his first year in office, he has not really felt constrained by.

25:39

You're saying this is something we haven't really seen in any major way until this ruling, and we don't actually know how Trump is gonna respond.

26:05

Yeah, I mean, we know that Trump is immediately responding by trying to put on these tariffs and just disregarding Congress, which if he really wanted to pursue these tariffs that he initially put on, he could go down the path of using the legislative branch. But right now, Trump is not interested in that. He likes to do things unilaterally and he likes to do things quickly. And so is a significant moment in which Trump has to readjust to a real constraint on his power.

26:14

Okay, I wanna just pull back for a minute. One thing that does seem clear is that we are now living in a world with tariffs. Whether we're talking about 15% tariffs or higher, the US seems to have permanently at this point moved away from truly and absolutely abiding by free trade principles and move toward a definitively more protectionist and nationalist economy by default. How should we think about that?

26:43

You know, over the next decade, irrespective of what's just happened here, there is going to be an element of tariffs that are going to be part of our lives and are going to be part of all of these countries and companies lives. And as a result it really has shifted potentially permanently or at least semi permanently the relationship the United States has with the rest of the world.

27:17

Well, Tyler, Anna, Andrew, thanks for coming on the show.

27:45

Thank you.

27:49

Thanks so much Natalie.

27:49

Thanks for having us.

27:51

We'll be right back.

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Here's what else you need to know Today. An armed man was shot and killed by law enforcement officers after he entered the secure perimeter of Mar A Lago early Sunday morning. The local sheriff identified the man as Austin Tucker Martin, a 21 year old from North Carolina. Authorities say Martin was carrying what appeared to be a shotgun and a fuel canister and that when he was ordered to drop the items, he put down the canister but raised the shotgun to a shooting position, prompting officers to open fire. President Trump wasn't at the resort at the time. He had hosted state governors at the White House the night before, and Heavy snow pounded through the Northeast and Mid Atlantic on Sunday as a major winter storm forced widespread transit shutdowns and thousands of flight cancellations. Over 35 million people from eastern Maryland to eastern Massachusetts were under blizzard warnings. More than 2ft of snow is expected in parts of New England. If New York City's snowfall hits 18 inches as forecast, it will be the heaviest in a decade. The city banned non essential travel until noon on Monday, and officials in New Jersey imposed a travel ban for most drivers that's expected to lift around 7am on Monday. As of Sunday night, most flights in and out of Kennedy Airport, LaGuardia Airport and Newark Airport had been canceled. Governors in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maryland, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania and Delaware declared states of emergency. Today's episode was produced by Diana Wynn and Mooj Zaidi. It was edited by Devin Taylor and Lisa Chow, contains music by Marion Lozano and Dan Papp and was engineered by Chris Wood. That's it for the Daily I'm Natalie Kitrowet. See you tomorrow.

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