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The Supreme Court’s conservatives don’t seem to be buying Trump’s trillion-dollar tariff play

Published

3 months ago

November 5, 2025

Conservative members of the Supreme Court on Wednesday appeared skeptical of President Donald Trump’s sweeping unilateral tariffs midway through arguments in a case that’s a pivotal test of executive power for a tool central to his broader agenda.

While the questions at times seemed to challenge the rationale for the tariffs, the arguments are still ongoing, and further questioning could shed additional light on their positions. A decision in the case could take weeks or months.

The Republican administration is trying to defend the tariffs central to Trump’s economic agenda after lower courts ruled the emergency law he invoked doesn’t give him near-limitless power to set and change duties on imports.

The Constitution says Congress has the power to levy tariffs. But the Trump administration argues that in emergency situations the president can regulate importation — and that includes tariffs.

Justice Amy Coney Barrett grilled the government on that point. “Has there ever been another instance in which a statute has used that language to confer the power?” she asked.

Justices Neil Gorsuch also questioned the government on whether Trump’s position would hand congressional powers to the president.

Trump has called the case one of the most important in the country’s history and said a ruling against him would be catastrophic for the economy.

The challengers argue the 1977 emergency powers law Trump used doesn’t even mention tariffs, and no president before has used it to impose them. A collection of small businesses say the uncertainty is driving them to the brink of bankruptcy.

The case centers on two sets of tariffs. The first came in February on imports from Canada, China and Mexico after Trump declared a national emergency over drug trafficking. The second involves the sweeping “reciprocal” tariffs on most countries that Trump announced in April.

Multiple lawsuits have been filed over the tariffs, and the court will hear suits filed by Democratic-leaning states and small businesses focused on everything from plumbing supplies to women’s cycling apparel.

Lower courts have struck down the bulk of Trump’s tariffs as an illegal use of emergency power, but the nation’s highest court may see it differently.

Trump helped shape the conservative majority court, naming three of the nine justices in his first term. The justices have so far been reluctant to check his extraordinary flex of executive power, handing him a series of wins on the court’s emergency docket.

Still, those have been short-term orders — little of Trump’s wide-ranging conservative agenda has been fully argued before the nation’s highest court. That means the outcome could set the tone for wider legal pushback against his policies.

The justices have been skeptical of executive power claims before, such as when then-President Joe Biden tried to forgive $400 billion in student loans under a different law dealing with national emergencies. The Supreme Court found the law didn’t clearly give him the power to enact a program with such a big economic impact, a legal principle known as the major questions doctrine.

The challengers say Trump’s tariffs should get the same treatment, since they’ll have a much greater economic effect, raising some $3 trillion over the next decade. The government, on the other hand, says the tariffs are different because they’re a major part of his approach to foreign affairs, an area where the courts should not be second-guessing the president.

The challengers are also trying to channel the conservative justices’ skepticism about whether the Constitution allows other parts of the government to use powers reserved for Congress, a concept known as the nondelegation doctrine. Trump’s interpretation of the law could mean anyone who can “regulate” can also impose taxes, they say.

The Justice Department counters that legal principle is for governmental agencies, not for the president.

If he eventually loses at the high court, Trump could impose tariffs under other laws, but those have more limitations on the speed and severity with which he could act. The aftermath of a ruling against him also could be complicated, if the government must issue refunds for the tariffs that had collected $195 billion in revenue as of September.

The Trump administration did win over four appeals court judges who found the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA, gives the president authority to regulate importation during emergencies without explicit limitations. In recent decades, Congress has ceded some tariff authority to the president, and Trump has made the most of the power vacuum.

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Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court at https://apnews.com/hub/us-supreme-court.

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Published

51 seconds ago

January 21, 2026

Jace Porter

Nestled in the heart of Bangkok’s Chinatown, the Ong Ang Canal served as a vital trade artery in the 18th century. Over time, it became heavily polluted, and even earned a reputation as the city’s dirtiest canal.

Last month, as part of a broader government effort to revitalize the canal, Siam Cement Group (SCG), Thailand’s oldest cement firm, unveiled the country’s first 3D-printed pedestrian bridge across its waters.

The bridge is part of SCG’s drive to bring new construction materials to Southeast Asia, Surachai Nimlaor, who helms its operations in cement and green solutions, tells Fortune in a Jan. 20 interview.

The company first started applying 3D printing tech to construction in the early 2020s, including the 2023 construction of the world’s first 3D printed medical center in Saraburi, Thailand.

“When we use 3D printing, we can shorten construction time and create buildings with unique shapes that conventional builders may not be able to achieve,” says Nimlaor.

The process involves creating a digital model, slicing it for the 3D printer, and then allowing the printer’s robotic arms to set down concrete, layer-by-layer, to form structures. By removing the need for traditional molds or formwork, it enables freeform architecture which includes sculptural curves and undulating walls. SCG’s 3D printed medical center, for instance, has fluid facades that would be difficult to execute with conventional cast concrete.

Courtesy of Siam Cement Group

This technology could be especially valuable for Thailand, where an aging population and a workforce wary of construction jobs is shrinking the sector’s pool of available workers. Nimlaor explains that the industry has been forced to turn to foreign workers from neighboring countries like Cambodia and Myanmar. (According to 2025 data from Cambodia’s Ministry of Labour and Vocational Training, there are over 1.2 million Cambodian workers in Thailand, many of whom are employed in construction.)

Still, 3D printed buildings are often only one or two storeys tall, Nimlaor admits, as taller buildings introduce “material constraints around structural loads and stability.”

Thailand’s first cement firm

SCG was founded in 1913 to build Bangkok’s first cement plant, under the orders of then-King Rama VI. In the century that followed, the company expanded to focus on three core businesses: cement and building materials, chemicals, and packaging.

Today, SCG is Thailand’s largest building materials company, with a 2024 revenue of $14.5 billion. It ranks No. 21 in Fortune’s Southeast Asia 500 list, which sorts the region’s largest companies by revenue. SCG has also expanded to other parts of Southeast Asia, including packaging businesses in Malaysia and a petrochemical plant in Vietnam.

Greening the construction industry

Beyond 3D printing, SCG is also developing low-carbon cement, tackling an industry that accounts for roughly 8% of global carbon emissions, according to the World Economic Forum.

SCG is trying to formulate cement produced using biomass, like wood. This cuts the carbon emissions from the production process by as much as 20% per ton, Nimlaor claims. SCG now exports its low-carbon cement to the U.S. and Australia, where developers now prefer materials that meet ESG standards.

“ESG has become a very strong driver in the global market,” he explains. “Many companies now have clear carbon-reduction targets and sustainability commitments.”

SCG hopes to launch the third-generation of its low-carbon cement, which would cut carbon emissions from production by up to 40%, but Nimlaor has hopes that they can eventually cut emissions by up to 90%.

Looking forward, SCG hopes to continue pushing the boundaries in creating greener construction materials. “Sustainability and business growth must go together,” he concludes.

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Business

Fortune Article | Fortune

Published

32 minutes ago

January 21, 2026

Jace Porter

Bitcoin is one of the world’s most battle-tested pieces of software. Launched in early 2009, the network has run continuously without being hacked, and today feels more secure than ever. There is, however, a threat on the medium-term horizon that threatens not only Bitcoin but every other type of software that relies on current encryption technology. That threat is quantum computing and, on Wednesday, Coinbase announced it has created a board of outside experts to prepare for its eventual arrival.

The board includes academics from Stanford, Harvard, and the University of California with specialties in fields like computer science, cryptography and fintech. Formally known as the Coinbase Independent Advisory Board on Quantum Computing and Blockchain, it is also composed of experts in blockchain and security from the Ethereum Foundation, the DeFi platform EigenLayer and from Coinbase itself.

In an interview with Fortune, Coinbase Chief Information Security Officer Jeff Lunglhofer explained how the arrival of quantum computing could defeat current encryption mechanisms, including the ones employed to protect the wallets and private keys held by Bitcoin owners.

“In simple terms, modern cryptography relies on hard math problems that would take thousands of years for a modern computer to solve,” he said. “But when we have a million times the horsepower [with quantum computing], that will provide the computation power to solve them.”

While the security threat of quantum computing is real, it is unlikely to be an urgent issue for at least a decade, according to Lunglhofer. His view is consistent with other experts who note that, while companies like Google and IBM have been building quantum computers for years, the current generation of these machines can only operate at a small scale and are not close to being able to crack the algorithms that protect Bitcoin and other networks.

The purpose of the new Advisory Board, says Lunglhofer, is to explore the coming impact of quantum computing in a “non-hype based way.” This will include promoting efforts by the blockchain industry, which are already underway, to update Bitcoin and other networks so that they are resistant to quantum-based attacks.

Currently, the Bitcoin network secures wallets by means of private keys, which are long strings of random numbers and letters that are visible to their owners, but that can only be guessed by means of an impossibly long series of trial-and-error attempts. When the quantum computing era arrives, it will be possible to guess a private key using trial-and-error. In response, Lunglhofer says, blockchain experts anticipate that Bitcoin and other networks will respond by creating larger keys and, at the same time, introducing “noise” to make the location of the key harder to detect in the first place.

All of this will require blockchain networks to introduce and deploy these defensive upgrades, a process that is likely to take years. In the interim, the new Advisory Board will begin publishing research papers and issuing position statements to help the crypto industry prepare for the arrival of quantum computing. The group plans to publish its first paper, which will focus on quantum’s impact on the consensus and transaction layers of blockchain, in the next month or two.

“Quantum computing is both a technological opportunity and a security challenge. By bringing together the foremost experts in the world, Coinbase is ensuring that the blockchain ecosystem is prepared, not just reactive,” said Yehuda Lindell, Head of Cryptography at Coinbase, in a statement.

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Business

The Walmart C-suite reshuffle shows how the retailer sees itself now: as a tech company

Published

1 hour ago

January 21, 2026

Jace Porter

When Walmart last week announced that David Guggina, its U.S. e-commerce chief executive, would become CEO of its nearly $500 billion U.S. division, one thing stood out in his résumé: Unlike his predecessors, Guggina has no experience running stores and has never held a merchandising role, at Walmart or elsewhere. These are two classic job requirements in retail. Incoming Walmart CEO John Furner, for example, who has run U.S. operations since 2019, began his Walmart career as an hourly associate in 1993, and held roles in merchandising, operations, and sourcing.

But there’s another realm of experience that Guggina does have in spades: e-commerce, automation, and supply chain. And by putting him atop the division that generates 69% of company revenue, Walmart is signaling that it now sees itself as a tech company, as well as a retailer. Guggina has spent eight years at Walmart, after nine years at arch-rival Amazon.com. In its announcement, Walmart touted Guggina’s work in building delivery capabilities to serve 95% of U.S. households in under three hours, and said his appointment “positions him to continue to drive our goal of being America’s favorite place to shop.”

In the last decade, after years of fits and starts, Walmart has emerged as a formidable e-commerce player, with U.S. digital sales of almost $100 billion a year—still far behind Amazon, but well ahead of any other U.S. retailer. In its most recent quarter, Walmart’s U.S. e-commerce rose 27%. That has been the result of billions in investments to integrate Walmart’s 4,600 stores with its e-commerce operations. This work has helped ensure faster shipping while also integrating technology more effectively into things like inventory management, supply chain, and in-store customer service. Guggina was instrumental in those achievements, working under Furner, who will become Walmart Inc’s new CEO next week.

“This is a unique moment in retail,” Guggina said in a LinkedIn post about his appointment. “AI is changing how people shop, and customer expectations are higher than ever. But no one is more prepared to usher in the next era of retail.”

The timing of Guggina’s promotion was fitting: It came soon after Walmart moved its shares from the New York Stock Exchange to the Nasdaq exchange, where tech giants such as Amazon, Google, and Microsoft list their shares. In December, Walmart said the move underscores its “technology-forward approach.”

Guggina isn’t the only techy whose star is rising at Walmart. The company also appointed Seth Dallaire chief growth officer for Walmart U.S., charging him with pushing Walmart U.S. further beyond traditional retail into tech-heavy lines of business—including its booming advertising, media, and online marketplace ventures. Dallaire is a veteran of Instacart and Amazon.

Walmart is considered by analysts to be well ahead of other retailers in AI-assisted shopping. In October, it announced a partnership with OpenAI to allow shoppers to browse and buy Walmart products directly inside ChatGPT, using a built-in instant checkout feature. Last week, Walmart and Google announced their own shopping tool. Also last week, Walmart’s executive vice president for AI acceleration, product and design, Daniel Danker, suggested at a conference that the company was developing auto-ordering for the replenishment of staples.

Bolstering Walmart’s tech and AI aura has had the additional benefit of lifting the company’s stock: In the last year, Walmart shares have risen 27%, double the S&P 500’s growth and trouncing Amazon’s 1% increase.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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