Court sides with Trump on tariffs

A federal appeals court agreed on Tuesday to allow President Donald Trump to maintain many of his tariffs on China and other US trading partners, extending a pause granted shortly after another panel of judges ruled in late May that the import taxes were illegal.

- TONY ROMM

The decision, from the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, delivered an important but interim victory for the Trump administration, which had warned that any interruption to its steep duties could undercut the president in talks around the world.

But the government still must convince the judges that the president appropriately used a set of emergency powers when he implemented the centrepiece of his economic agenda this year. The Trump administration has already signalled it is willing to fight that battle as far as the Supreme Court.

The ruling came shortly after negotiators from the United States and China agreed to a framework intended to extend a trade truce between the two superpowers. The Trump administration had warned that those talks and others would have been jeopardised if the appeals court had not granted a fuller stay while arguments proceeded.