Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the United States would have to refund half of the tariffs if has collected if it loses its case on President Trump’s trade agenda at the Supreme Court.
Bessent said he feels “confident” the Trump administration will win the fight to rescue President Trump’s tariffs, but acknowledged it will be costly if there is a loss in the conservative-leaning High Court.
During an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Bessent was asked by host Kristen Welker whether the administration was prepared to offer rebates on the tariffs if the Supreme Court ruled against them.
“I am confident that we will win at the Supreme Court,” he said.
Pushed as to whether the administration would “be prepared” to offer rebates, Bessent said the U.S. “would have to give a refund on about half the tariffs,” adding that it “would be terrible for the Treasury.”
“There’s no ‘be prepared,’” he said. “If the court says it, we’d have to do it.”
Trump is pushing for the Supreme Court to greenlight his tariffs after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit struck down the bulk of Trump’s tariffs, ruling the president can’t use emergency powers to justify levies imposed on dozens of trading partners.
Trump said the country would be on “the brink of economic catastrophe” unless the Supreme Court rules the tariffs are legal.
“The President and his Cabinet officials have determined that the tariffs are promoting peace and unprecedented economic prosperity, and that the denial of tariff authority would expose our nation to trade retaliation without effective defenses and thrust America back to the brink of economic catastrophe,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer said in a statement, according to The Associated Press.
This story was first posted at 12:25 p.m. and was updated at 6:08 p.m.
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