Dan Wolff, partner with Crowell & Moring, joined "Forbes Newsroom" to discuss potential lawsuits against the Trump administration's tariffs.
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00:00Well, given the number of lawsuits we've seen just over the last week, I'm wondering, this is a crystal ball question, but do you think we'll see more?
00:08I do. I do, just given the economics of the moment.
00:14I don't think, I think, and I think we're starting to see the cracks in the dam.
00:21We had, you know, the first lawsuit was filed early last week.
00:24Now we, this, you know, we, then we had another one, the district court in Montana, brought by several members of an Indian tribe.
00:35And now we have this one that was filed yesterday, and I don't see any reason to think that we'll stop with three.
00:43And does the court care about the economic hardship that some of these businesses are already facing?
00:49I think what I'm getting at is a timing question here.
00:51For a lot of small business owners that we've been speaking to at Forbes, it feels like an immediate existential question.
00:58They're already facing higher costs to import their goods.
01:02So they need help now.
01:04What I'm wondering is, does that emergency on behalf of the small business owners affect the way any of these courts will proceed?
01:11Well, it could, to the extent that the parties are seeking either preliminary injunctive relief or expedited review.
01:23And I'll note that neither the first case filed in the district court in Florida, nor the one filed yesterday, at least as of last evening when I last checked the docket, had moved for a preliminary injunction.
01:34And we see a lot of the other challenges to executive actions over the last couple months involve actions, motions for temporary restraining orders and preliminary injunctions.
01:45That's the mechanism to move a case along.
01:48That's the mechanism by which plaintiffs state, if we don't get relief immediately, we will suffer irreparable harm.
01:54The only case of the three that we've talked about here that has filed a motion, the only set of plaintiffs of the three that we've talked about here challenging the IEPA tariffs that has moved for a preliminary injunction is the one in district court, is the one out in the district court of Montana, which I think is itself interesting.
02:15Now, in terms of whether the harm to the small businesses as a general matter heightens the importance of this matter, generally speaking, I don't think that, you know, I think that the tariff setting authority under IEPA and the magnitude of it by itself is going to be the more compelling reason to elevate these cases.
02:44You know, possibly, you know, possibly up to the Supreme Court, I think it's just a very important legal question or set of legal questions.
02:51You know, the sympathetic plaintiff, you know, that you see that in a lot of cases.
02:56So I don't know if that by itself, certainly when you get to the Supreme Court and they tell the narrative of the story, and we've seen this in any number of cases, you know, that that that that that small plaintiff narrative, you know, sort of under attack by the federal government,
03:13that plays into that there's a sympathetic fact, there's a sympathy factor, but it's going to be the legal question that I think drives that drives these cases.