Despite Trump administration’s efforts to limit tariff refunds, American importers are one step closer to receiving $166 billion in universal rebates
Court of International Trade Judge Richard Eaton, who is presiding over all tariff refund cases, has demonstrated repeated support for universal rebates, ruling in March that all importers who paid IEEPA tariffs were entitled to refunds, issuing a universal refund order the next month.
- importers could be one step closer to automatically receiving all of the $166 billion in tariff refunds following the Supreme Court’s ruling against the levies imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).
- The Trump administration, however, has disputed the universal refund order, appealing it in June on the grounds that Eaton exceeded his authority in issuing the universal refund order, and that the government cannot give out refunds to importers unless they have sued to recover the money they lost in tariffs.
- While more than $115 billion have been disbursed back to American companies as of August through Customs and Border Protection’s Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (CAPE) system, thousands of importers—such as small businesses and individuals who purchased tariffed items online—have yet to receive their money back.
President Donald Trump has historically taken legal action against universal injunctions, like last June, when the Trump administration won a legal battle to narrow a universal injunction order that initially blocked Trump’s executive order to limit birthright citizenship.
- Court of International Trade to enter a relief order on Tuesday, which would return money collected from the tariffs to the more than 330,000 importers of record, whether or not they filed an individual lawsuit against the administration.
- The Trump administration is fighting for only importers who sued for the refunds to receive them.
- The Supreme Court’s February ruling that tariffs imposed under IEEPA exceeded the president’s powers, paved the way for hundreds of billions of dollars in tariff refunds to U.S.
- They’ve encountered technical errors in their CAPE submissions, lack the legal resources of larger importers and did not submit appropriate paperwork, or went through a larger third-party importer of record.
- Class counsel in a tariff refund class action against the Trump administration filed a motion in the U.S.
How this summary was made: extractive summary — built from the sources' own reporting. It is drawn only from the reporting of the sources listed below — read the originals for full detail. How we summarize →