Refund Promises Clash With Scale: IEEPA Tariffs Under Scrutiny
After vowing easy refunds for unlawfully collected IEEPA tariffs, the government faced the Supreme Court ruling and a court-ordered refunds, but CBP now says it cannot deliver refunds at scale, citing ACE software limitations and other logistical hurdles. The controversy hinges on judicial estoppel and massive refund logistics: roughly $166 billion in duties across more than 53 million entries by over 330,000 importers, with around 20 million entries unliquidated; CBP says it would take 45 days to build new functionality to process refunds. Critics say the administration misrepresented the ease of refunds to win injunctions and must follow through with actual delivery.