But the Democratic-led states strongly refute this reasoning, insisting in the lawsuit that “the Administration cannot use forced labor as a pretext to continue its illegal tariff scheme. The tariffs the USTR imposed are so broad that they defy the USTR’s own stated aims and make a mockery of the statute used to justify them.”
California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who co-led the coalition, claimed Trump is “so intent on raising the cost of living for Americans that he is willing to break law after law after law to do so.”
“Tariffs are taxes, and the American people cannot and should not shoulder the extra costs that come from the President’s failed and illegal economic policy—no matter how much the President wants them to,” he added, in a statement announcing he is suing the Trump Administration over its tariffs for a third time.
Joining California in the lawsuit are Arizona, New York, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Kentucky, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Maryland, Maine, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, North Carolina, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia Washington, and Wisconsin.
