IEEPA refund certifications pass $86 billion; CIT orders Phase 3 reliquidation for suing importers

U.S. Customs and Border Protection reported in a 13 July 2026 status declaration to the U.S. Court of International Trade — the declaration of Brandon Lord, CBP’s Executive Director for Trade Programs — that refunds of approximately $86.3 billion had been certified and sent to the Treasury Department for disbursement and that $121.75 billion in refund claims had been accepted for processing as of 10 July; 9,837 certified refunds had not yet been transmitted for want of banking information.¹ In orders of 15 and 17 July Senior Judge Richard K. Eaton, in the consolidated refund proceedings’ lead case Freestyle World, Inc. v. United States, No. 1:26-cv-01088, directed CBP across the approximately 3,700 IEEPA refund cases on his docket to “reliquidate, without regard to IEEPA duties, any and all of Plaintiffs’ entries that have been liquidated for more than 80 days” on which the plaintiffs made estimated deposits under the IEEPA orders — the finally liquidated universe for suing importers, with the reliquidation channel running through the CAPE Phase 3 tool as it deploys — with a CBP progress report due 4 August and a settlement conference set for 5 August.² The Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (CAPE) tool’s Phase 2, covering reconciliation-flagged entries, deployed at 5:00 a.m. eastern time on 29 June — 1.97 million reconciliation-flagged entries had been filed by 10 July — and Phase 3, the build for finally liquidated entries of importers who have sued at the CIT, remains on the end-of-July schedule CBP committed to at the 9 June show-cause hearing (see CIT show-cause hearing: CAPE Phase 3 refund tool by end July).³⁴ The refund flow follows the Supreme Court’s 20 February 2026 holding in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump that IEEPA does not authorise tariffs; the government stated in the proceedings that approximately $166 billion was collected.⁵⁶

1. The 15-17 July orders reach only the plaintiffs before the court: the “any and all of Plaintiffs’ entries” formula gives the roughly 3,700 suing importers reliquidation of finally liquidated entries while the same relief for non-litigants awaits two pending tracks — the government’s Federal Circuit appeal — noticed in early June (2 June per Morgan Lewis; 3 June per Holland & Knight) — contesting the refund orders to the extent they require reliquidation of finally liquidated entries of importers not before the court, and the motion filed 4 June in V.O.S. Selections, Inc. v. Trump, CIT No. 25-00066, to certify a mandatory class under USCIT Rule 23(b)(2) of all importers whose refund claims remain ineligible for CAPE filing.²⁷⁸ The finality framework in dispute is 19 U.S.C. § 1514(a), under which liquidation decisions are “final and conclusive” absent timely protest within the 180-day window of § 1514(c)(3), with reliquidation authority at § 1520 (refunds and errors).⁹

2. The arithmetic of the remaining exposure follows from the government’s own figures: $121.75 billion accepted against approximately $166 billion collected leaves roughly $44 billion in collected duties not yet accepted for processing — concentrated in the finally liquidated entries that Phase 3, the Freestyle World orders and the class motion address through their separate channels — while interest accrues on refunds from the date of deposit under 19 U.S.C. § 1505(c).¹⁶¹⁰ CBP’s prior public data point — $71.06 billion paid and $104.29 billion authorised as of late June — frames the July run-rate.¹¹