The U.S. government so far is on tap to reimburse $85 billion worth of tariff refunds. But there’s still a way to go for the government to fully reimburse companies for the now-unconstitutional tariffs — or before any of those funds may be returned to customers.A new court declaration from Brandon Lord, the director of the Office of Trade at U.S. Customs and Border Protection, said the government has accepted about $85 billion worth of potential and certified refunds for processing.
So far, just about $20.6 billion worth of refunds has been sent to the U.S. Treasury for disbursement. But there’s roughly $166 billion in illegal duties owed to importers overall.
The refunds are for tariffs that were ordered by President Donald Trump under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. But the U.S. Supreme Court in late February said in a 6-3 ruling that the act didn’t authorize the president to issue tariffs single-handedly.
Since then, CBP, the federal agency that handles tariff payments, has begun operating a new system to process billions of dollars in refunds to importers. In late April, it launched a new functionality called the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (CAPE) to calculate and verify what refunds companies are owed.
