A conservative legal group suing the Trump administration in Texas over the president”s unilaterally imposed tariff system have asked a federal judge to declare the levies “unlawful as a matter of law” and grant their request for summary judgment, effectively ending the case in favor of the plaintiffs.

In a 22-page motion filed Monday in the U.S. District Court in Austin, Texas, the New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA) asserted the authority to impose such tariffs lies exclusively with Congress and that President Donald Trump exceeded the power of the presidency by implementing they tariff system through a series of executive orders that have “triggered chaos in financial markets.”

“The President has asserted authority to impose new tariffs on any imports, from any country, in any amount he chooses,” the motion states. “The President issues, postpones, and rescinds the Executive Orders seemingly at whim. These Executive Orders have upended the tariff system that Congress designed and enacted over a course of decades. But the President lacks the authority to issue any of them.”

According to the group, the president has attempted to bypass mandatory congressional authorization and instead unilaterally imposed the levies by invoking an obscure emergency power — specifically, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977 (IEEPA) — in a manner that has never been done since that statute was passed nearly a half-century ago.

The NCLA argues that Trump’s use of an emergency statute in the absence of any actual emergency is explicitly unlawful — an argument reminiscent of challenges to the president’s invocation of an 18th-century wartime power to conduct mass deportations with little or no apparent due process, despite the fact that the U.S. is not at war.

Additionally, the group asserts that even in the case of an actual emergency, the IEEPA does not permit Trump to impose tariffs without the approval of Congress.

“He has dressed the Executive Orders (the ‘Tariff Executive Orders’) in the guise of an ’emergency’ by citing the International Economic Emergency Powers Act. But emergency or no, IEEPA does not authorize tariffs — it has nothing to do with them,” plaintiffs wrote. “The Constitution vests exclusive control over tariffs with Congress and Congress has not granted the President any ’emergency’ authority to order tariffs. IEEPA’s text, structure, and longstanding interpretation all dictate this conclusion. IEEPA authorizes certain economic sanctions to defend Americans against ‘foreign threats’ — but it says nothing about taxing Americans by imposing tariffs. It never mentions the topic.”

Such “statutory silence” on the tariff issue is sufficient to end the case in plaintiffs favor because “the President cannot treat Congress’s silence on a topic as an affirmative grant of power,” the motion continues.

To bolster its claim, the group points to the U.S. Supreme Court’s rulings invalidating the Biden administration’s attempt to forgive hundreds of billions in federal student loans as well as its effort to force the nation’s power plants to transition away from coal, both of which were based on executive emergency powers.

“The conclusion that IEEPA did not authorize tariffs is further confirmed by a series of recent Supreme Court decisions striking down Executive Branch efforts like the one challenged in this case: attempts that cite general statutory language, in an inventive way, to claim authority that is sweeping and unprecedented,” the NCLA wrote. “The decisions have applied the major questions doctrine, which requires a showing of ‘clear congressional authorization’ for the authority the President claims.”

The NCLA filed the complaint on behalf of outdoor cooking manufacturer FIREDISC, the nonprofit Game Manufacturers Association (GAMA), and Ryan Wholesale, a company that manufactures timber trusses and other wood products. The suit alleges that the “unconstitutional” tariffs will force the plaintiffs to pay more, thereby driving up their costs as well as the prices for their customers.

“The illegal tariffs continue to damage millions of people and businesses across the country unconstitutionally,” John Vecchione, Senior Litigation Counsel for NCLA said in a recent statement. “The IEEPA gives the President no tariff power and is not a tariff statute. It is now up to the courts to stop them.”

This is the second such lawsuit filed by the non-profit group over President Donald Trump’s levies. The first lawsuit filed by the group challenging Trump’s tariffs has been transferred to the U.S. Court of International Trade in Manhattan.