Ammon News - A dozen U.S. states, most of them led by Democrats, sued President Trump over his tariffs on Wednesday, arguing that he has no power to “arbitrarily impose tariffs as he has done here.”

Contending that only Congress has the power to legislate tariffs, the states are asking the court to block the Trump administration from enforcing what they said were unlawful tariffs.

“These edicts reflect a national trade policy that now hinges on the president’s whims rather than the sound exercise of his lawful authority,” said the lawsuit, filed by the states’ attorneys general in the U.S. Court of International Trade.

The states, including New York, Illinois and Oregon, are the latest parties to take the Trump administration to court over the tariffs. Their case comes after California filed its own lawsuit last week, in which Gov. Gavin Newsom and the state attorney general accused the administration of escalating a trade war that has caused “immediate and irreparable harm” to that state’s economy.

Officials and businesses from Oregon, the lead plaintiff in the suit filed Wednesday, have also expressed concerns about the vulnerability of the state’s trade-dependent economy, as well as its sportswear industry, as a result of the tariffs.

The other states in the suit are Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico and Vermont. All of the states have Democratic attorneys general, though Nevada and Vermont have Republican governors. NYT