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Lessons from the First U.S. Win in a Trade and Labor Dispute: The USMCA RRM Atento Decision

For the first time, an arbitral panel has sided with the United States in a trade and labor dispute. On August 21, the United States and Mexico announced the publication of the second panel decision under the USMCA/T-MEC/CUSMA Facility-Specific Rapid Response Labor Mechanism (RRM).
Kathleen Claussen 03 Sep 2025 8 min read

IELP Blog Relocation

Just a quick note to readers that the platform on which the IELP blog is hosted is shutting down at the end of September. Bear with me over the next few weeks as I find a new platform. Blogging might be a bit light during this period.
Simon Lester 27 Aug 2025 1 min read

U.S. State Capitalism as a Response to Chinese State Capitalism

In an interview last week, David Faber of CNBC pressed Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on several Trump administration actions that could be characterized as "state capitalism": Faber: As somebody who's been around the capital markets for years, as you have been, I do wonder, how do
Simon Lester 26 Aug 2025 4 min read

A Few Thoughts on Antitrust and Big Tech

I'm no antitrust expert, but I do have some opinions on it, and I'm going to offer a few of them in this post. As an intro, I want to mention a speech by Notre Dame law professor Roger Alford -- whose Opinio Juris blog posts have
Simon Lester 24 Aug 2025 3 min read

Wentong Zheng on Presidential Tariffs

University of Florida law professor Wentong Zheng has posted a new paper called "Presidential Tariffs," in which he argues that the IEEPA should not be interpreted to allow the President to proclaim tariff modifications for the purpose of entering into market-opening trade agreements, given that Congress allowed
Simon Lester 22 Aug 2025 1 min read

Matthew Schaefer on Trump Administration Trade Policy: A Historical Perspective and Key Questions & Takeaways

The following is an excerpt from a new Yeutter Institute piece by University of Nebraska law professor Matthew Schaefer entitled "Trump Administration Trade Policy: A Historical Perspective and Key Questions & Takeaways," offering a good roundup of a lot of the biggest trade policy issues out there at
Simon Lester 22 Aug 2025 11 min read

Todd Tucker on Tariffs and the Role of Courts

In an op-ed in the FT entitled "Opponents of Trump’s tariffs should be wary of relying on the courts," Todd Tucker argues against U.S. courts striking down Trump's IEEPA tariffs. I have some questions and comments on his views of this issue, focusing
Simon Lester 17 Aug 2025 7 min read

Guest Post: Trump, Trade and Coercion

This is a guest post from Boston College law professor Frank Garcia. (Cross-posted from the Cambridge University press blog) The first year of Trump’s second term has been a chaotic one for trade, as for so much else. Before inauguration, the President had already threatened tariffs against Denmark
Simon Lester 13 Aug 2025 7 min read

What Trump's Trade Representative Got Wrong

Last week, USTR Jamieson Greer wrote an essay in The New York Times entitled, ‘Trump’s Trade Representative: Why We Remade the Global Order’. Simon has already done the heavy lifting by asking some necessary questions about this new order. Out of all the inaccuracies and “too early to tell”
Mona Paulsen 12 Aug 2025 3 min read

New Security Exception Language Establishes a Two-Tiered Approach

Via Mona Paulsen and Devon Whittle, I see that Chapter 28 of the UK-India trade agreement has some interesting new language on security exceptions. It starts off as expected, with the following: Article 28.2 Security Exceptions 1. Nothing in this Agreement shall be construed to: (a) require a
Simon Lester 11 Aug 2025 3 min read

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What Does the Blue Wave Mean for U.S. Trade Policy?

Tariffs and trade policy were one element that played a role in last night's result. So what impact will Democratic control of Congress have on the administration's trade policy going forward?
04 Nov 2026 4 min read

A Proposal To Expand Judicial Review over Section 232 and 301 Tariffs

For many people in Washington these days, having U.S. trade actions judged by international tribunals on their consistency with trade agreements is controversial. But what if that judgment of consistency could be done by US courts instead?
01 Nov 2026 3 min read

What Kind of Discrimination Should Section 338 Target?

A couple weeks ago, the U.S. International Trade Commission asked for public comments on implementing Section 338.
25 Sep 2026 5 min read

Jake Sullivan Wants To Build On the Biden Administration's Industrial Policy

In a recent article, Jake Sullivan makes the case for continuing on with the Biden administration's economic policies, arguing for an even broader and more comprehensive industrial policy than what we saw under Biden.
13 Sep 2026 6 min read

How Difficult Will It Be Politically To Remove Trump's Tariffs?

Heather Hurlburt, who was the Chief of Staff for U.S. Trade Rep. Katherine Tai from 2022-2024, recently poured some cold water on the idea that Trump's tariffs might be removed quickly after he is out of office.
12 Aug 2026 3 min read

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