According to the article, "US customs agency says tariff refund system progressing, but payments may take up to 45 days", the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CPB) said recently it was making progress in setting up a streamlined process for refunding some $166 billion in tariff collections deemed illegal by the Supreme Court, but that its new system could take up to 45 days to review and process refund applications.

Tariff Refund System between “60 and 85 Percent” Complete

In a filing with the U.S. Court of International Trade, CPB official Brandon Lord said the development of a new refund claims portal, review, processing and refund system is now between 60 percent and 85 percent complete. He did not provide a start date for applications, but the agency previously had indicated a 45-day goal, a deadline that ends in late April.

System Will Accept Claims in Phases

In the declaration filing recently, Lord said the new system will begin accepting claims in phases, with first priority given to those customs entries liquidated, or finalized, within the preceding 80 days and entries whose liquidation status has been "suspended, extended, or under review."

The initial phase will also accept declarations containing warehouse and warehouse withdrawal entries, Lord said.

The filing also said some 26,664 importers of record had completed the process to receive electronic refunds, representing 78 percent of entries for which duties or deposits under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) had been paid, an amount totaling $120 billion.

U.S. Supreme Court Decision

The U.S. Supreme Court last month struck down President Donald Trump's broadest global tariffs under IEEPA, dealing a blow to the central economic policy of his administration.

More than 330,000 importers paid the IEEPA tariffs on 53 million shipments, according to court documents.

The Supreme Court did not provide guidance on refunding the tariff payments that had been collected from importers since February 2025, leaving that matter to the Court of International Trade in New York City.

Large Importer Refunds Could Take “Up to Five Years”

Many large importers such as FedEx sued CBP to protect their right to a refund, which Trump said could take up to five years. Many smaller importers feared the cost of the refund process would outweigh the benefits of trying to get reimbursed.

Judge Richard Eaton of the Court of International Trade earlier this month ordered CBP to begin processing refunds using its existing system, but the agency instead proposed a new process that would be ready to accept refund applications as soon as April 2026 and would not require importers to sue.

Discussion Questions

  1. What is a tariff? Who pays for a tariff?

    A tariff is a tax that a government places on goods imported from another country. The importing company, not the foreign exporter, pays the tariff. Ultimately, the importing company may raise consumer prices to account for the tariff.

  2. Describe the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). Refer to Teaching Tip 1 of this newsletter (“Supreme Court Strikes Down Tariffs.”) What was the U.S. Supreme Court’s justification for striking down President Trump’s sweeping tariffs?

    The International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) is a U.S. federal law passed in 1977 that gives the U.S. president broad authority to regulate economic transactions during a national emergency involving an “unusual and extraordinary” foreign threat. After declaring a national emergency related to a foreign threat, the president can: (1) block or freeze foreign assets in the United States; (2) prohibit financial transactions; (3) restrict trade and imports/exports; and/or (4) impose economic sanctions on individuals, companies, or countries.

    In February 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down President Trump’s most expansive tariffs in a 6-3 ruling because the Court concluded the president lacked the legal authority to impose them under the IEEPA. The Court held that the IEEPA does not authorize the president to impose tariffs or other taxes on imports. The law permits the president to “regulate…importation,” but the majority said that this phrase does not include the power to levy duties or taxes, a power traditionally exercised by Congress. Tariff authority is fundamentally a taxing power that the U.S. Constitution vests in Congress, not the president. The Court emphasized that Congress must clearly authorize any executive branch power to impose tariffs and that the IEEPA’s broad language was too vague to delegate this significant authority. At least part of the majority opinion invoked the “major questions” doctrine, which says that when an executive action has vast economic and political significance, Congress must clearly grant that authority. The Court found that using a general emergency law to impose tariffs of unlimited scope and duration was not clearly authorized by Congress.

  3. As the article appears to indicate, the described tariff refund system will reimburse businesses for the tariffs they paid upon importing goods into the United States. What about the millions of U.S. consumers who paid higher prices as a result of these tariffs?

    A study by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy reported that approximately 96 percent of the tariff costs ended up with U.S. importers and consumers, with only about four percent absorbed by foreign exporters.

    In your author’s assessment, the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision invalidating these tariffs will likely result in a windfall for U.S. importers in the sense that the importers have already passed along the cost of the tariffs in terms of increased prices for consumers, but they will now be able to make a claim for reimbursement through the tariff refund system for having paid the tariff initially. This means that consumers will, unfortunately, be left “holding the bag.”