The Supreme Court announced Tuesday it will take up whether President Trump can use emergency powers to justify sweeping tariffs on trading partners across the globe, agreeing to the administration’s request to hear its appeal — and fast. 

The expedited schedule will have the justices take the bench for oral arguments in the first week of November, a late addition to the calendar.

Solicitor General D. John Sauer has minced no words in describing the stakes, telling the justices that Trump’s tariffs are his “most significant economic and foreign-policy initiative.” 

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in a 7-4 decision rejected Trump’s assertion that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) justified his sweeping tariffs.  The justices agreed to take up that case and a separate underlying lawsuit filed in the nation’s capital.

The administration has held out hope that the conservative-majority Supreme Court will rescue the tariffs, quickly appealing the ruling to the justices and urging them to move with speed. 

Enacted in 1977, IEEPA authorizes the president to impose necessary economic sanctions during an emergency to combat an “unusual and extraordinary threat.”  

Trump first invoked the law in February, citing an emergency over fentanyl to impose tariffs on Canada, China and Mexico. He later established an emergency over trade deficits to implement his global “reciprocal” tariffs on trading partners across the globe and pressure them into trade deals.  

Trump’s tariffs can remain in place until the Supreme Court resolves the case.  

Businesses and Democratic-led states have challenged Trump’s tariffs as unlawful, stressing that no prior president has invoked the emergency law to impose tariffs and it doesn’t authorize Trump’s sweeping initiative. 

Though they emerged victorious in the lower courts, they did not oppose the Supreme Court taking up the case or hearing it on the expedited timeframe.