"Liberation Day" reciprocal tariffs

On April 2, 2025 — branded "Liberation Day" — President Trump announced sweeping reciprocal tariffs: a 10% baseline on imports from nearly every country, with sharply higher country-specific rates (for example a 34% rate on China, among the highest). The legal vehicle was a national emergency declared under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), a statute written to let presidents freeze foreign assets in true emergencies — not to set import duties.

That legal theory was the whole fight. On May 28, 2025, the U.S. Court of International Trade ruled the IEEPA tariffs illegal; the Federal Circuit agreed in August 2025; and on February 20, 2026, the Supreme Court held 6–3 in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump that "IEEPA does not authorize the President to impose tariffs". CBP stopped collecting all IEEPA-based duties within days. That is why this entry is tagged struck-down, not in-effect.

Status as of July 2026; verify before relying on this for decisions. The administration tried to replace the lost revenue with a 10% global surcharge under a different law (Section 122) starting February 24, 2026 — see that entry for its own legal trouble — but the original Liberation Day IEEPA tariffs are dead.

Plain-English: the April 2025 "reciprocal" tariffs were imposed under a law courts said doesn't cover tariffs, were collected for about ten months, and are no longer in force. Refund litigation over the duties that were paid is still working through the courts.

Directly: U.S. importers paid the duties while they were in force (roughly April 2025 – February 2026)

Ultimately: Consumers, while the tariffs were collected; refund eligibility is now the subject of litigation

Whether importers get that money back hinges on whether the Court of International Trade's universal refund injunction survives appeal.