WASHINGTON — A Texas company is suing the Trump administration to overturn steep metal tariffs imposed earlier this year.

Waller-based Sim-Tex, a pipeline products distributor, on Wednesday joined a California company and the American Institute for International Steel to challenge the constitutionality of the law that President Donald Trump used to pursue import levies on steel and aluminum.

The coalition argues that the statute wrongly gives the president unfettered trade powers — in the name of national security — that should actually rest with Congress.

"Why can't he decide tomorrow that whiskey is a national security issue? Or eyeglasses? Or underwear? How ridiculous can we get?" Chuck Scianna, Sim-Tex's president, told The Dallas Morning News earlier this month.

If history is any guide, the lawsuit is a long shot.

The coalition conceded the fact that the Supreme Court has not overturned legislation since the 1930s on the basis the group is arguing, though it countered that "there has never been a statute that has provided as little control over the president" in such a complicated field.

But the action still underscores deep concerns held by many businesses in Texas and beyond over Trump's aggressive trade agenda.

Sim-Tex and its counterparts say they are being unfairly harmed by the tariffs, which now cover metal imports from close U.S. trading partners including Canada and Mexico. With no relief in sight, they say costs are increasing to the point where jobs are at risk.

"I don't know what we're going to do late third quarter and fourth quarter," Scianna told The News.

Trump's trade skirmish has evolved into an escalating tit-for-tat trade war.

A fundamental driver continues to be the president's decision to impose tariffs of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum. He said the levies were a matter of national security, given the fraught state of America's metal-producing industries.

"If you don't have steel, you don't have a country," Trump has said.

That approach has heartened the steel sector, which remains adamant that the president is in the right.

"It's pretty hard to challenge the president's authority to provide for the national security for the United States," John Ferriola, CEO of North Carolina-based Nucor Corp., told The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday. "At the end of the end of the day, the president's policies will prevail."

But the move has raised questions, beyond just the economics, about Trump's use of what's known as Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962.

The measure gives the president the ability to enact tariffs relatively quickly if there are national security concerns. Trump hasn't used it just for metals, either. He's also raising Section 232 to investigate whether the U.S. should also impose tariffs on imported automobiles.

Lawmakers such as Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., have responded by pressing a need to rein in the executive branch's authority under that provision. Business groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce have — so far, unsuccessfully — urged Congress to take action on that kind of legislation.

Sim-Tex's lawsuit opens a new front, arguing in court that the law doesn't impose needed limits on the president's power.

The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. Court of International Trade, naming the United States and U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Kevin McAleen as defendants. The customs agency, which enforces the tariffs, said it could not comment due to pending litigation.