Of course it's worth noting that CBP repeatedly argued in its previous court filings that there was no need for an injunction to halt the tariffs while they were being litigated, because if the tariffs were found to be unlawful, it could easily refund them.
For instance:
> In other words, plaintiffs’ asserted irreparable harm is the purported inability to obtain a refund after a final and unappealable decision because of liquidation. But that asserted harm is nonexistent here because defendants have made very clear—both in this case and in related cases—that they will not object to the Court ordering reliquidation of plaintiffs’ entries subject to the challenged IEEPA duties if such duties are found to be unlawful. Because defendants’ representations make clear that liquidation will not interfere with the availability of refunds after a final decision, plaintiffs cannot be irreparably harmed by liquidation.
We need some mechanism in litigation (and imho in public life in general) that requires claims to be secured in some way. That is, if you go into court and make an argument like this, you have to chain it to consequences, such as being stripped of specific legal consequences or losing 10% of your shares or whatever.
It's illegal to commit perjury, but there are no real consequences for making bous legal arguments, and lawyers are structurally incentivized to make tacit misrepresentations on behalf of their clients - that is, to make inflated or handwavey claims in the hope that they're not challenged during the fact-finding stage, or even stipulated, due to an assumption of basic good faith.
> because if the tariffs were found to be unlawful, it could easily refund them.
I think it's worth emphasizing that the US government argued not only that it could issue refunds, but that it would issue refunds and that it would not oppose an order to do so. In addition to the quote from the US government's opposition to a motion for preliminary injunction, there are these quotes mentioned in the opinion for the linked order [0]:
> [E]ven if future entries are liquidated, defendants do not intend to oppose the [c]ourt’s authority to order reliquidation.... Such reliquidation would result in a refund of all duties determined to be unlawfully assessed, with interest.
> Defendants “will not oppose the [c]ourt’s authority to order reliquidation of entries of merchandise subject to the challenged IEEPA duties and that they will refund any IEEPA duties found to have been unlawfully collected, after a final and unappealable decision has been issued finding the duties to have been unlawfully collected and ordering defendants to refund the duties.”
> “If tariffs imposed on plaintiffs during these appeals are ultimately held unlawful, then the government will issue refunds to plaintiffs, including any post-judgment interest that accrues.”
> For any plaintiff who is an importer, even if a stay is entered and defendants do not prevail on appeal, plaintiffs will assuredly receive payment on their refund with interest. ‘[T]here is virtually no risk’ to any importer that they ‘would not be made whole’ should they prevail on appeal. The most ‘harm’ that could incur would be a delay in collecting on deposits. This harm is, by definition, not irreparable. Plaintiffs will not lose their entitlement to a refund, plus interest, if the preliminary injunction is stayed, and they are guaranteed payment by defendants should the [c]ourt’s decision be upheld. And defendants do not oppose the reliquidation of any entries of goods subject to IEEPA duties paid by plaintiffs that are ultimately found to be unlawful after appeal.
> To the extent that any future entries are liquidated, the [c]ourt may order reliquidation of entries subject to the challenged de minimis exemption if the duties paid by Axle are, in a final and unappealable decision, found to have been unlawfully collected. Such reliquidation would result in a refund of all duties determined to be unlawfully assessed, with interest.
"Lies" is a standard operating procedure under this administration.
The court should just call the bluff by passing an order "Every CBP official and their hierarchy up to the President will be fined $1 million/day until the tariffs have been refunded."
SCOTUS has already given the President complete immunity for anything done as part of an "official act", so that's not going to fly (even if it should).
> And it doesn't apply to anyone who isn't the president.
They have a cool loophole for it. President can pardon those who commit crimes he asks them to commit. See what he did for thousands of insurrectionists and a lot of his friends who bribed him.
It's one of several "checks and balances" whereby one branch can override another branch, in this case the executive can override the judicial. Congress (the legislative) can override the executive too, by firing the President if they feel he's breaking too many laws (or indeed for any reason they want). It's a wonder they haven't chosen to. It indicates Congress approves of what the President is doing.
I think this is sort of final proof that electing a king for four years with more or less total power as the presidential system outlines is fundamentally a shit system.
This is just a new (and primarily conservative) interpretation of the system (the so-called "unitary executive" theory).
There's a different interpretation where the existing laws constrain the executive, there is no "unitary executive", and the result is a highly constrained presidency. E.g. Biden attempting to use explicit language written by Congress to do something and being told he could not do so by the judiciary (for "reasons").
It isn't strange per se. The Chief executor by definition has discretion. The thing that's gone haywire now is that discretion is being used in a repugnant manner to most actually sane people.
Isn't it only immunity as long as Congress is controlled by the same party so that no impeachment/conviction? Otherwise, Congress technically still has that ability. That's also what Trump was screaming the whole time that Congress is the only way to hold POTUS accountable.
> That's also what Trump was screaming the whole time that Congress is the only way to hold POTUS accountable.
And this is just wrong - anyone can see that every branch must be held accountable by other branches. This supreme court has done more damage to America than most historical supreme courts.
SCOTUS didn't say that Congress couldn't impeach. As I understand it, SCOTUS said that POTUS couldn't be prosecuted as a civilian for things he did as POTUS. This puts an asterisk on the "no man above the law", as they are saying that if POTUS does something impeachable but Congress doesn't impeach/convict, then there's no other recourse for holding POTUS accountable. Trump is taking advantage of that for everything that it's worth.
Somebody really has it out for you killing your comments
I see what you're saying. As much as I dislike it, it makes sense if you agree with the Project 2025 view of the power of POTUS. Clearly the majority of SCOUTS does with that ruling. I don't agree with it as I don't think the founding fathers would have ever wanted POTUS to have that much protection, but I'm of no significance so what I do or don't agree with is just some guy on the internet yelling at clouds.
But the important thing is that Trump has restored gender integrity in girls' high school sports, he has bombed 7 countries instead of 5 like Biden did, and he has been deporting... uh, well, about the same number of undocumented people as Biden.
I guess that's three important things, not just one, but you get the idea.
We spent this whole time up until now exclaiming that it was actually the consumer who pays the tariffs, and now it’s the corporation that gets a “refund”.
It'll be repaid to whoever paid it in the first place (typically an importer, not you unless you're an importer). So any beef to do with not getting a refund should be directed at the domestic supply chain. I note that Costco has stated they will pass on the refund to their customers.
In Costco's case they sell branded goods as loss leaders because they make up the cost via the membership fees, margins engineering thanks to Kirkland Signature, extremely diligent SKU management, and only targeting the upper 50% of households by income [0][1].
As such, they can eat the cost of a "refund" because the actual cost is hidden in the membership fee anyhow.
Costco is a case study in how to run a business - promote operational leadership internally, charge a subscription, segment your ICP based on purchasing ability, and ruthlessly negotiate with vendors (eg. Costco's alcohol purchasing department has LVMH and by extension the government of France over a barrel as they are the single largest purchaser of wine globally, and from personal experience Kirkland's Single Malt Islay - retail of $35 - is a white label of Bunnahabhain's Cruach Mhona - retail of $150-200).
The bottom 50% shop at Walmart. The top 50% at Costco. It's an interesting symbiosis.
A Costco membership, a mid-end Toyota or Honda, maxing out your Roth 401K, putting the 50-60% that remains into a mixed VOO-VTI-VWO-VXUS strategy, upskilling as cheaply as possible (OMSCS@GT or UT Austin) and a 25 year roof is the path to riches.
You forgot selling your soul and integrity to the business sector, destroying the future of the next generation of engineers, rolling up the ladder behind you, merging and consolidating to avoid competition... I can go on.
> The bottom 50% shop at Walmart. The top 50% at Costco.
If that is true (not sure), then why does Costco treat all its customers like hardened criminals by demanding to scan receipts at the door? If they are targeting higher income households, you'd think they would show a bit more respect to the customers?
This is why I refuse to have anything to do with costco. I'm comfortably in the top few% of income.
The CBP seems to be asserting that they lack the technical resources to issue the refunds in a timely fashion. Thus, when they finally comply, they (well, the US taxpayer) will end up paying more interest - probably around $20M/day (assuming 4% and $175B in illegal tariffs collected).
Perhaps this Administration should ask Musk to bring in a team to revamp the systems involved to get these refunds "in the mail" quickly. The DOGE team must be done with the Social Security system rewrite by now so may be available for this task. Maybe Big Balls is free this weekend to take care of this...
This is going to be such a continued mess. Refund it to the companies that paid the tariffs, it's quite the windfall. Consumer refunds ain't gonna happen.
Economically, under usual times, the best thing to do with it would be to pay off some national debt with it, the deficit is out of control. But with $38T of debt, nothing really makes a dent.
Agreed. I'm hesitant to give money back to companies that have already passed the cost of tariffs on to the the consumer.
But I'm 100% against the government keeping money it took illegally.
And the court can only require that the money be refunded to those that paid the tariffs. Therefore I am ok with that.
> U.S. Customs and Border Protection told a Court of International Trade judge on Friday that it is not currently able to comply with his order to begin refunding reciprocal tariffs imposed last year by President Donald Trump, which the Supreme Court recently ruled are illegal.
> ...
> “Customs knows how to do this,” Eaton said during a court hearing on Wednesday. “They do it every day. They liquidate entries and make refunds.”
It seems that CBP doesn't even provide a _reason_ for their inability to comply with the order (or this is some bad reporting and the reason was left out). I find that humorous and disappointing.
CBP's declaration (which the article links to) has more details. They're arguing that they can't currently issue refunds, and they can't even currently stop IEEPA duties from being charged on future liquidations, because of software limitations.
They say they're going to comply with the order, but they want 45 days to develop the required software changes and processes.
And they used their supposed ability to refund tariffs as justification for continuing to charge them during a court case last year, per another comment in this thread. We live in unserious times.
You absolutely can, if you're rich. Rich people settle their tax debts with the IRS for pennies on the dollar all the time, with the threat of dragging the government into years of expensive litigation if the offer isn't accepted. You and I, of course, don't have this option.
If that is the case, if people are not jailed for contempt of court, it shows what the tariffs were really for. Enriching the politicians and the 1%, which is all the US Gov. is for these days.
Thankfully we have the actual court filing to refer to get the full picture, in which CBP says they are working on a way to process refunds more efficiently than they are able to today, and they aim to do so within 45 days: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cit.193...
I’m not trying to muddy any situation. I don’t have to: Reality has a lot of nuance.
Besides, it is possible to both agree that these tariffs should never have been implemented in the first place and have some sympathy for the agency that has literally never had to do something like this at this scale before and is now under duress to come up with a working, legal, and fair mechanism for implementing one at breakneck speed.
CBP is a sprawling agency charged with a broad variety of responsibilities. You can possess furious anger at the gestapo-like tactics the Border Patrol have engaged in while also feeling sympathy for the customs agent charged with accurately collecting duties on millions of dollars worth of imports every day and filing the mountains of paperwork that go along with that.
> you'll have to dig very deep to strike any sympathy for the CBP
Not me. They’re ordinary people doing administrative tasks. Most of them have dutifully turned up for work and done their jobs as the law required them to. They’re now being asked to work overtime to fix a mistake they didn’t make.
That’s not true. 2 different courts ruled them illegal months ago. The administration decided to fight it abnd each time they lost.
It certainly would have been prudent for cbp to contemplate this very scenario given their own lawyers predicted it. But let’s be honest, that would have gotten them fired.
For instance:
> In other words, plaintiffs’ asserted irreparable harm is the purported inability to obtain a refund after a final and unappealable decision because of liquidation. But that asserted harm is nonexistent here because defendants have made very clear—both in this case and in related cases—that they will not object to the Court ordering reliquidation of plaintiffs’ entries subject to the challenged IEEPA duties if such duties are found to be unlawful. Because defendants’ representations make clear that liquidation will not interfere with the availability of refunds after a final decision, plaintiffs cannot be irreparably harmed by liquidation.
https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cit.172...
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