The International Trade Commission decided Friday that the solar industry is being hurt by cheap solar panel imports, setting the opportunity for President Trump to issue tariffs.

The unanimous 4-0 vote by the commission does not dictate any action.

Rather, the commission will now have until November to recommend specific actions to the Trump administration, which would then have two months to issue a potential remedy such as tariffs.

The decision facing Trump over whether to impose tariffs presents a major test of the president's "America First" trade agenda and how it fits with his pledge to support U.S. "energy dominance."

His deliberation comes as the wider solar industry is booming in recent years, providing momentum for the transition away from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources.

Solar power still makes up a tiny portion— about 1 percent — of electricity generation in the U.S. But solar costs have fallen by about 70 percent since 2010, and the domestic industry now employs more than 260,000 people, according to the Solar Foundation.

While the broader U.S. solar energy opposes tariffs, two U.S. companies asked the Trump administration to act.

In April, solar panel manufacturer Suniva, later joined by SolarWorld, petitioned the International Trade Commission for tariffs on solar cells and a price floor on modules for imports coming from anywhere in the world, arguing that cheap foreign products, mostly from Asian countries, are harming the domestic panel industry.

Both companies are bankrupt and foreign-owned (Suniva is based in Georgia but is majority-owned by a Chinese company), though they primarily manufacture in the U.S.

But other companies across the solar energy industry warn that tariffs could harm the industry's progress by increasing their costs and would force them to raise prices for consumers.

"This petition is an attempt to hold an industry, and frankly the future of the planet, hostage to try to help out one or two companies," Ed Fenster, chairman of San Francisco-based Sunrun, which installs solar panels on homeowners' roofs told the Washington Examiner.

The Solar Energy Industries Association, the main trade group for the U.S. solar industry, testified before the commission asking it oppose the petition.

The trade group estimates 88,000 U.S jobs could be lost from a tariff, representing one-third of the $19 billion industry's workforce.

"While we continue to believe that this is the wrong decision, based on Suniva and SolarWorld's mismanagement, we respect the commission's vote and we will continue to lead the effort to protect the solar industry from damaging trade relief," said Abigail Ross Hopper, the president and CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association. "We expect to be front and center in the ITC remedy process, and in the administration's consideration of this deeply-flawed case."

Before the trade commission voted, governors of four solar-friendly states -- Nevada, Colorado, Massachusetts and North Carolina -- urged it to reject the petition, warning tariffs could jeopardize the industry.

"The requested tariff could inflict a devastating blow on our states' solar industries and lead to unprecedented job loss, at steep cost to our states' economies," the two Republicans, Brian Sandoval of Nevada and Charlie Baker of Massachusetts, and two Democrats, Ray Cooper of North Carolina and John Hickenlooper of Colorado, wrote in a letter Thursday to the trade commission.

Tim Brightbill, a lawyer representing SolarWorld, which is German-owned, countered that although lower prices have allowed more Americans to go solar, U.S. producers are struggling to compete with foreign companies.

He urged Trump to impose tariffs, arguing such a move fits squarely into the administration's agenda.

"We certainly think our goal of increasing U.S. manufacturing and U.S. jobs are closely aligned with the administration's goals," Brightbill told the Washington Examiner. "If this administration is looking for ways to address trade issues constructively, solar is an industry that needs support in order to make sure it stays in existence."