After a court defeat, the US revives tariffs and India is a target

The Donald Trump administration has found a new way to tax the world’s goods, and India is on the wrong side of it. On June 2, the US Trade Representative proposed extra tariffs of 10–12.5 per cent on 60 economies for failing to stop imports made with forced labour. It is the White House’s first major tariff move since the Supreme Court struck down its earlier tariffs in February. This time, the legal ground looks firmer. The earlier “Liberation Day” tariffs relied on emergency economic powers that the Supreme Court rejected in February, ruling that the law did not allow…