White House trade advisor Peter Navarro speaks to members of the media near the West Wing of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., August 21, 2025.
Nathan Howard | Reuters
President Donald Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro said Sunday that “it will be the end of the United States” if the president’s sweeping tariffs are ultimately blocked by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Navarro’s comments echoed Trump’s own rhetoric as the president sharply criticized last week’s 7-4 appeals court decision, which ruled that most of Trump’s tariffs are illegal, placing a central tenet of the administration’s economic agenda on shaky ground.
The final ruling on the matter is likely to be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court. As the battle over Trump’s tariffs intensifies, the president’s advisers are casting the ultimate outcome as pivotal to the future of the country.
“This was weaponized partisan injustice at its worst,” Navarro said on Fox’s “Sunday Morning Futures.”
“If we lose the case, President Trump is right. It will be the end of the United States,” he said.
Navarro also said that he feels “very optimistic” about the administration’s arguments to the Supreme Court.
“A very good dissent provides a road map for the Supreme Court. We feel very optimistic,” Navarro said.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held Friday that Trump overstepped his presidential authority when he invoked the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act to justify the sweeping “reciprocal” tariffs against virtually every country in the world.
The appeals court allowed Trump’s tariffs to stay in effect until Oct. 14, giving the Trump administration time to appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.
“If these Tariffs ever went away, it would be a total disaster for the Country,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social after the ruling.
He added that “with the help of the United States Supreme Court, we will use [tariffs] to the benefit of our Nation, and Make America Rich, Strong, and Powerful Again!”
Trump later on Sunday reiterated his dire warning about the tariffs.
“Without Tariffs, and all of the TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS we have already taken in, our Country would be completely destroyed, and our military power would be instantly obliterated,” he wrote on Truth Social.
Trump’s claims that his tariffs have already generated “trillions of dollars” for U.S. coffers are false. So far this fiscal year, the U.S. has generated $142 billion in tariff revenue, according to the most recent Treasury Department data. And much of that amount was derived from customs duties received before Trump’s tariff “liberation day” in April. Most of the levies announced as part of that roll-out didn’t take effect until early August.
The Tax Policy Center estimates that Trump’s tariffs will raise a total of about $2.9 trillion for fiscal years 2026 through 2035 — if Trump’s tariffs are ultimately found to be legal.
Still, Trump’s tariffs are not paid for by foreign governments or companies. American consumers typically bear the brunt of the tariffs, as U.S. businesses often have to raise prices to respond to higher costs. The Tax Policy Center estimates that Trump’s tariffs would impose “a burden of about $2,700 in 2026 for the average taxpayer.”
Without court action, the tariffs were set to affect roughly 69% of U.S. goods imports, according to the Tax Foundation, but if blocked, the duties would impact just roughly 16%.
Parts of Trump’s agenda remain safe from Friday’s court decision. Most notably, his sector-specific levies on steel and aluminum remain unaffected by the appeals court’s ruling.