The Lawfare Podcast: Trade War Powers: Past, Present and Future

Jen Patja, Scott R. Anderson, Kathleen Claussen
Monday, August 31, 2020, 12:00 PM

Published by The Lawfare Institute
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Earlier this month, the Trump administration re-imposed tariffs on aluminum imports from Canada, signaling a new salvo in the now years-long trade war it has been waging with countless U.S. trading partners. But what gives the president the authority to pursue such measures unilaterally, even when he lacks support from members of his own party in Congress? To talk through this question, Scott R. Anderson sat down with Kathleen Claussen of the University of Miami School of Law and Timothy Meyer of Vanderbilt Law School. They discussed the scope of the president's authority over trade, where it came from and what a future Congress might be able to do about it.



Jen Patja is the editor of the Lawfare Podcast and Rational Security, and serves as Lawfare’s Director of Audience Engagement. Previously, she was Co-Executive Director of Virginia Civics and Deputy Director of the Center for the Constitution at James Madison's Montpelier, where she worked to deepen public understanding of constitutional democracy and inspire meaningful civic participation.
Scott R. Anderson is a fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution and a Senior Fellow in the National Security Law Program at Columbia Law School. He previously served as an Attorney-Adviser in the Office of the Legal Adviser at the U.S. Department of State and as the legal advisor for the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq.
Kathleen Claussen is Professor of Law at Georgetown University Law Center. Prior to joining academia, she was Associate General Counsel at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. She was previously Legal Counsel at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague. Professor Claussen’s primary teaching areas and research interests include: international economic law, dispute settlement & procedure, and international security and cybersecurity issues. Her work has been published in the Yale Law Journal, the Yale Journal of International Law, the American Journal of International Law Unbound, among others.
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