00:00The legal battle over tariffs adds to the economic uncertainty businesses are trying to navigate.
00:06An analysis from Reuters has found that Donald Trump's trade war has, so far,
00:10cost companies more than $34 billion in lost sales and higher costs, with that figure tipped to rise.
00:17Jeff Moon is former assistant U.S. trade representative for China.
00:22It's definitely significant. It's a bit unexpected.
00:25But the impact is really mixed.
00:27From an economic and trade perspective on the ground, it probably doesn't make much difference,
00:33because even if Trump's tariffs pursuant to the International Economic Emergency Powers Act are invalidated,
00:41he has other legal authorities that he can use immediately to bring tariffs back up to the same level.
00:48Now, the economic effect, however, is different than the political effect.
00:51The political effect, of course, is that Trump has lost faith, that he doesn't have the authority that he thought he had.
00:59But in terms of democracy, I think this is a great victory.
01:03This shows that democracy is working.
01:06The judiciary is acting as a check on executive authority.
01:10And all of this happened because small businesses and states went to court to rein in executive authority.
01:16So that's why I say the picture is mixed.
01:19So there are these legal levers at President Trump's disposal.
01:24But is the administration's argument that tariffs are necessary for national security or economic protectionism legally viable?
01:32Well, there are different meanings of those words.
01:36You know, there are those words that we use them in common parlance and those words in terms of their legal effect.
01:43What strikes me is the fact that we've been running deficits here in the United States in terms of our trade with foreign countries for literally decades.
01:51And it's a bit surprising that that's never been considered an emergency before.
01:55I think a lot of countries, if they were running deficits on this level, would definitely consider it to be an emergency.
01:59Now, some of Trump's tariffs don't fit into that category.
02:03And here I'm thinking about the fentanyl tariffs.
02:06Fentanyl is a criminal problem.
02:08It is not a trade problem.
02:09It really doesn't belong in this context.
02:12But certainly I think the deficit question does.
02:15And, Jeff, you described this is a victory for democracy, for the rule of law.
02:19But how do these ongoing legal battles impact the reputation of America in terms of its partners and its allies?
02:29Well, the U.S. trade representative just had an interview about two hours ago on American TV, and he says that the conversations with all the partners are continuing.
02:40And I think that's appropriate.
02:41A lot of them are not really commenting because it's not really clear where this is going to go, especially if I'm correct that, you know, in terms of what's happening on the ground, it really won't have that much of a difference.
02:52And what's your sense of the long-term impact of these tariffs?
02:56We've seen $34 billion in estimated business losses due to them.
03:02Could the real number end up being much higher?
03:04There are just too many variables out there for us to really know right now.
03:08What we do know is that Trump has backed off from catastrophic tariffs.
03:16When we were up to 145 percent and bilateral trade with China was essentially paralyzed, he stepped back because that kind of destruction was really unnecessary and unwarranted and unwise.
03:29So I can't predict a number, but I do predict that we will be at a level where bilateral trade will be able to continue.
