In a document submitted to the US Court of International Trade (CIT) this week, the administration of US President Donald Trump announced it has refunded 100 billion USD in import tariffs. These tariffs were collected under tax policies citing the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). This amount represents 60% of the 166 billion USD the government had collected.
The tariff refunds began in May, following a US Supreme Court ruling in February that invalidated these taxes and required the government to reimburse importers.
In late April, US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) implemented the CAPE system to track and process the refunds.
As of 31/7, the system had received over 252,000 refund requests, linked to more than 25 million import declarations. CBP official Brandon Lord stated that CAPE had processed nearly 129 billion USD in "potential" refunds. Of this, approximately 100 billion USD had been confirmed and transferred to the Department of the Treasury for disbursement.
Import tariffs were a cornerstone of Mr. Trump's economic and foreign policy during his second term. However, many of his policies were rejected by courts. The US President has repeatedly expressed anger at these rulings.
"Tariffs have produced incredible results; we've collected hundreds of billions of US dollars. The Supreme Court caused a slight setback, but we are still permitted to proceed in other ways," Mr. Trump said in an interview with Fox News on 4/8.
Recently, the US government has implemented a series of measures to re-establish import tariff policies. The latest involves imposing tariffs of 10-12,5% on 60 economies for unfair trade practices. However, this new tariff policy is also being challenged in the CIT.
Ha Thu (according to Reuters)
