The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on March 2 remanded the International Emergency Economic Powers Act tariff case to the U.S. Court of International Trade despite U.S. government efforts to delay this process and without waiting for a formal Supreme Court mandate.
This effectively means that the CIT may begin considering and possibly issuing instructions on the IEEPA tariff refund process. The CIT will now decide whether or how refunds should be issued to affected importers, although the U.S. government may appeal any eventual decision to the CAFC and potentially to the Supreme Court.
The CIT could proceed in one of several ways. For example, the court could require that companies file post-summary corrections and protests in order to get refunds. If U.S. Customs and Border Protection denies a protest for some reason, then the company would have to sue at the CIT within 180 days of the protest’s denial to seek a refund. The court could instead hold that companies must sue in the CIT to seek refunds without protesting, which would result in a landslide of cases being filed and the court then having to address them individually. Alternately, the court could devise, or order CBP to create, a refund process unique to the IEEPA tariffs.
For more information, please contact your ST&R professional.
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