US states sue Trump administration over new tariffs

A coalition of 25 US states has sued the Trump administration over a new round of tariffs on goods from 60 trading partners, asking the US Court of International Trade to halt the measures, declare them unlawful and order refunds of duties already paid, according to the Guardian. The tariffs are set at 10% to 12.5% and took effect in July. The states argue the new duties are a workaround after the Supreme Court struck down an earlier set of import taxes in February.

The lawsuit turns trade policy into a direct fight over who gets to levy a broad-based consumption tax without calling it one. The states’ filing, as described by the Guardian, claims the administration is using the language of forced-labour enforcement as a pretext to restore tariffs that the courts have already rejected. Administration officials counter that the targeted countries have not done enough to crack down on imports produced by forced labor, and that the tariffs are grounded in Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, a law used to respond to foreign practices said to burden US commerce.

The coalition says the forced-labour rationale does not meet Section 301’s requirements in this case. That detail matters because it draws a line between narrow, investigation-based trade remedies and a general revenue instrument applied across most imports. The states involved say the tariffs affect 59 countries and the European Union and account for 99.4% of US imports, a scale that makes the policy less about a specific supply-chain abuse and more about the price level across the economy.

The plaintiffs include states such as New York, California and Illinois, with the governors of Kentucky and Pennsylvania also joining, the Guardian reports. New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, framed the dispute as one of executive power: after losing at the Supreme Court, she said, the administration is trying to raise taxes on families and businesses through tariffs. The complaint also asks for refunds, which would turn a legal win into an immediate budget and cashflow problem for the federal government, and a windfall—however temporary—for importers who have already paid.

A separate lawsuit, filed by the Liberty Justice Center on behalf of two small businesses, argues that Trump exceeded his authority with the new tariffs, according to the Guardian. The White House says it is acting lawfully and describes Section 301 tariffs as a “legally durable tool” since Trump’s first term.

The case will test whether the legal constraints that blocked the earlier tariffs also block their replacement. In the meantime, the tariffs remain in force, and the states are already asking the court to send the money back.