Attorney General Bonta Sues Trump Administration for a Third Time over Its Illegal Tariffs

Still illegal, will still make life more expensive for Americans 

OAKLAND — California Attorney General Rob Bonta today co-led a coalition of 25 states in filing a lawsuit against the Trump Administration challenging its new efforts to impose illegal tariffs on American consumers and businesses. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. Court of International Trade, challenges the Administration’s recent decision to increase tariffs on over 80 countries (the European Union and nearly 60 other countries), countries that together account for 99.4% of all U.S. imports — costs that will be passed along to Americans already struggling with affordability.

“President 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,” said Attorney General Bonta. “This is President Trump’s third attempt to illegally impose tariffs that would make life more expensive for American families and small businesses, and this is the third time we're taking the Administration to court over this misuse of power. 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.”

For more than a year, President Trump has inflicted chaos on the American economy by imposing tariffs without the legal authority to do so. A recent analysis concluded that nearly 90% of the costs of tariffs in 2025 were paid by American consumers and businesses. By imposing another round of price increases on American consumers and businesses, the Trump Administration is tripling down on its failed economic policies.

Failed Attempt #1: Initially, the President claimed that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) allowed him to impose tariffs of any amount, on any product, from any country, for any length of time. In February, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected that claim, agreeing that the IEEPA tariffs were unlawful. 

Failed Attempt #2: President Trump then turned to a separate law that had never been used before — Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 — and announced 10% tariffs on most products worldwide. But state attorneys general challenged those tariffs, too, and in May the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled that the President acted unlawfully.

Attempt #3: Rather than accepting those losses, President Trump has again turned to another law — Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 — and directed the United States Trade Representative (USTR) to investigate the European Union and nearly 60 other countries, ostensibly to determine whether those countries are doing enough to combat forced labor in global trade, and to consider tariffs pursuant to those investigations. Late last month, the USTR imposed 10% and 12.5% tariff rates on nearly every economy that trades with the U.S., timed to go into effect exactly the day President Trump’s last failed attempt to impose tariffs were set to expire. Today’s lawsuit challenges this latest round of tariffs and alleges that these actions exceed the Trump Administration’s legal authority under Section 301 and violate the Administrative Procedure Act.

Specifically, the attorneys general claim that the new Section 301 tariffs are pretextual and are not targeted to address the purported harms of forced labor but instead are designed to re-create the tariffs already declared illegal by various courts. Additionally, the USTR's investigation is not consistent with prior practice under Section 301. The investigation deployed to determine these tariffs targeted 60 economies at once, instead of investigating by individual country, and occurred in a very abbreviated 2.5-month timeframe, as opposed to the 12 months or more typical of these inquiries. The rushed nature of the investigation, the breadth of the tariffs, and the USTR's reliance on case studies and general macroeconomic studies as opposed to fact-intensive and case-specific findings in its investigation show that the Section 301 tariffs are pretextual and not designed to remedy the practice they claim to fix.

Today’s lawsuit is led by California Attorney General Rob Bonta, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, and Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield. Also joining are the attorneys general of Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Rhode Island, Virginia, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin, and the governors of Kentucky and Pennsylvania.