The Trump administration is vigorously using different levers of power to implement its America First trade agenda, commingling laws involving national security, foreign policy and economics to establish new barriers to trade. In addition to increasing tariffs on a variety of inbound goods, the administration is considering various options to limit the outbound flow of U.S. technology, particularly to China. While Congress contemplates changes to U.S. export controls and rules on foreign investment in the United States to address these issues, the Trump administration has suggested another potential tool: the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, 50 U.S.C. Section 1701–1707.

Enacted in 1977, the IEEPA provides the president with authority to undertake a wide range of actions in response to “any unusual and extraordinary threat, which has its source in whole or substantial part outside the United States, to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States,” but only if the president first declares a national emergency with regard to that threat. Although the authority conferred by the IEEPA is broad, Congress passed the act in an effort to limit the president’s authority to declare an indefinite state of national emergency during peacetime. Congress intended presidential use of IEEPA authority to be narrowly tailored, time-limited and subject to congressional oversight.

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