CBP files CIT status report on CAPE IEEPA-refund mechanism

On 12 March 2026 U.S. Customs and Border Protection filed its first status declaration with the U.S. Court of International Trade describing the IEEPA-refund mechanism under development within the Automated Commercial Environment — a module CBP refers to as the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (CAPE) module — under which the importer of record, or an authorised customs broker, will submit IEEPA refund requests as “CAPE Declarations.”¹ The declaration was filed with Senior Judge Richard K. Eaton in Atmus Filtration, Inc. v. United States, Court No. 26-01259, whose 4 March 2026 order directs CBP to liquidate unliquidated entries and reliquidate non-final entries without the IEEPA duties the Supreme Court held unauthorised in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump (No. 24-1287), consolidated with Trump v. V.O.S. Selections, Inc. (No. 25-250), decided 20 February 2026.²³ The collection unwind was implemented by CBP Cargo Systems Messaging Service Bulletin CSMS # 67834313, deactivating in ACE the IEEPA Chapter 99 subchapter III HTSUS subheadings (9903.01.01 Mexico fentanyl; 9903.01.10 Canada fentanyl; 9903.01.20 China fentanyl; 9903.01.25 reciprocal baseline) for entries on or after 12:00 a.m. ET on 24 February 2026; CAPE is the refund filing layer that sits above that unwind.⁴

1. Refund processing through CAPE follows the existing CBP administrative-protest workflow under 19 C.F.R. Part 174 and the statutory refund chain: importers file under 19 U.S.C. § 1514 within 180 days of liquidation per § 1514(c)(3); CBP reliquidates under § 1520(a) (refunds); and interest accrues from the date of deposit under § 1505(c).⁵ Filers require an ACE Portal account with an Importer of Record (IOR) Account ID linkage, and refund disbursements are made by ACH credit through Treasury-facilitated CBP refund processes.⁶⁷

2. Entries that liquidated more than 180 days before the SCOTUS ruling and against which no protest was filed are presumed final under § 1514(a) and ineligible for CAPE filing absent separate court action; single-entry bond claims (where the surety paid the duty) and continuous bond claims are processed in the same workflow with surety standing established by separate showing.⁸ USMCA-content carve-outs in the underlying IEEPA orders (where the USMCA-qualifying portion was duty-free or at reduced rates) require tracing documentation to confirm the refundable share.

3. The aggregate refund flow appears as offsets to customs receipts in the Treasury Monthly Treasury Statement customs-revenue line; § 1505(c) interest is scored against the General Fund separately.⁹ CBP’s status declaration does not yet provide a launch date, throughput forecast, or the CSMS bulletin number for the CAPE filing layer; subsequent CIT status reports are scheduled at intervals set by the court.¹