Trump warns countries they could face something ‘far worse’ if they try to renegotiate trade deals. What options do they have?

U.S. President Donald Trump warned trading partners not to use the Supreme Court’s recent decision invalidating his emergency tariffs as a reason to renegotiate trade agreements, insisting he could impose “far worse” terms using other legal powers.

Several governments have reached deals with the Trump administration that cut U.S. tariffs in exchange for investment commitments and lower barriers for U.S. imports. Yet Friday’s Supreme Court ruling wiped out tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), removing the main incentive for several of those agreements. Trump’s new universal tariff of 10%, imposed under a different process, complicates things further.

At his State of the Union address on Feb. 24, Trump called the Court’s decision “disappointing” and “unfortunate,” but claimed that “almost all countries and corporations want to keep the deal that they already made,” adding that the “legal power that I as president have to make a deal could be far worse for them.”

Trump’s remarks underscore the dilemma now facing U.S. trade partners, some of whom unveiled agreements just a few weeks ago. (Indonesia, with particularly unlucky timing, unveiled its agreement on Feb. 19, the day before the Court’s ruling). Governments spent months hammering out accords with Washington, sometimes making politically unpopular concessions and promises to get a deal over the finish line. 

Countries could try to suspend or renegotiate their trade deals, but that risks provoking higher tariffs from an angry White House. Or they can keep the agreements in place—even if that means their goods will get........

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