Trump advisers explore vast new legal powers for global trade war

Donald Trump’s economic advisers are eyeing aggressive new legal justifications to impose tariffs on all imports, seeking to buttress a second-term plan that would reshape the U.S. economy, according to public and private comments by top aides.

On the campaign trail, Trump has repeatedly promised to enact a “ring” around the U.S. economy by enacting a tariff of at least 10 percent on goods imported from any other nation. Trump’s plan would target more than $3 trillion in annual imports and risks sending inflation soaring in what would likely prove the biggest escalation of trade hostilities in decades, ratcheting up the standoffs that marked his first term.