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Comment by taylodl | Hacker News Reader

NAFTA is a treaty ratified by the Senate and as such, Trump can't easily implment the tariff as that undoes the treaty. Trump can count on the importers challenging the move in court. He'll probably use it as a gauge to see if the Senate will do anything to check his power - because they could, but I suspect the Senate will be the lackeys Trump is expecting them to be.

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> because they could

We'll be able to measure how much support for something like that he can get. Also, we can easily see Canada and Mexico retaliating against American goods with similar tariffs.

In any case, this is meant to stir up his supporters. If the Legislative blocks him, he still wins by becoming the victim of a "legislative power grab".

It'd be easier to play the victim if it weren't his own party controlling the legislature. That's where the Republicans are in a bit of a pickle - if their policies cause pain to the electorate then it's going to be really hard to pin it on the Democrats. Not impossible, but hard.

He will do it nevertheless. Plausibility is irrelevant to his base and he’ll gladly throw his party under the bus in order to secure more power.

To your point, it's worked so far so why not try it again? May as well keep doing it until it no longer works and then figure something else out, I guess.

Mexico supplies well over half of all produce consumed in the US, and produce prices have so far been less impacted by inflation/price gouging/however you prefer to think about it.

If this winds up going through, people all over the country are going to see the sticker shock at the store very quickly.

I mean, I guess the Senate has the power to revoke the treaty. Short of that, though, just standing aside means that it goes to court, as you said, where the Senate has no say. So I'm not sure you think this is a measure of the Senate's willingness to check Trump's power, because I'm pretty sure they're not going to repeal NAFTA. That would not be passively allowing him to run wild; it would be actively aiding him, which is a harder sell.

I have hope for the Senate. They weren't going to confirm Gaetz. Yeah, there are a bunch of other things they need to not go along with, but they aren't going to be complete doormats.

According to this page on Congress' web site, Presidents often terminate treaties by themselves:

https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artII-S2-C2-1...

If nothing else, the President can unilaterally declare that the other country is in breach of the treaty, so it's no longer in effect.

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