The Supreme Court struck down IEEPA tariffs four months ago. CBP has queued $95 billion for refund and actually disbursed $40 billion. But if your entries were "finally liquidated" before the CAPE clock started, the government now says you're on your own — unless you file a federal lawsuit. Here's what happened, what it means, and what you need to do before the window closes.
On February 20, 2026, importers across the country celebrated. The Supreme Court's 6-3 decision in Learning Resources v. United States declared the IEEPA tariffs unlawful — all of them, covering approximately $166 billion collected across 53 million entries from roughly 330,000 importers of record.
Four months later, the celebration has turned into a two-track system: importers who acted quickly are getting their money back. Importers who waited may never see a dime without hiring a lawyer.
At the June 9, 2026, hearing before Judge Richard Eaton at the Court of International Trade, CBP's Executive Assistant Commissioner for Trade, Susan Thomas, confirmed two things simultaneously. First, the good news: Phase 2 of the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (CAPE) refund system launches June 29, covering reconciliation entries, with Phase 3 targeting end of July. Second, the bad news: CBP reiterated its position that it cannot issue refunds on finally liquidated entries without an importer-specific court order.
That's roughly $30 billion in refunds that may require individual federal lawsuits to recover.
What CAPE Is and How It Works
CAPE is CBP's electronic refund mechanism within the Automated Commercial Environment (ACE) portal. It launched April 20, 2026, as the government's answer to the Court of International Trade's order requiring a scalable refund process for all importers — not just the handful who were plaintiffs in the original litigation.
Here's the simplified process:
- The Importer of Record (IOR) or authorized customs broker logs into ACE
- They navigate to the new CAPE tab and upload a CAPE Declaration — a CSV file listing entry numbers eligible for IEEPA refund
- Each declaration can include up to 9,999 entries; multiple declarations are permitted
- CBP validates the submission, removes IEEPA HTS tariff lines, recalculates duties
- Approved refunds are issued electronically via ACH within 60-90 days of acceptance
It's not automatic. Nobody gets a check in the mail just because the Supreme Court said the tariffs were illegal. You file, or you don't get paid.
The Three Phases: Who Gets Paid When
CBP structured the CAPE rollout in three phases, each expanding the universe of eligible entries:
| Phase | Launch Date | Scope | Estimated Coverage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Phase 1 | April 20, 2026 | Unliquidated entries + entries liquidated within 80 days of filing | ~63% of all IEEPA entries |
| Phase 2 | June 29, 2026 | Reconciliation entries | Additional subset |
| Phase 3 | End of July 2026 | Finally liquidated entries (contested) | ~37% of entries ($30B+) |
Phase 1 is already operational. As of late May, CBP reported that more than $95 billion had been queued for processing, with $40 billion actually disbursed by end of June. Phase 1 also expanded its scope in late March to accept entries with Suspended, Extended, or Under Review status, as well as warehouse entries and AD/CVD entries — though for these, CAPE removes the IEEPA codes but defers actual refund processing until normal liquidation occurs.
Phase 2 launches June 29 and covers reconciliation entries — entries filed using CBP's reconciliation program where final duty calculations were deferred.
Phase 3 is where it gets complicated.
The Government's Reversal: "Finally Liquidated" Means Finally Out of Luck
Here's the critical development that landed on May 29, 2026. In a motion filed with the CIT, CBP stated — for the first time since the Supreme Court ruling — that it lacks legal authority to refund IEEPA duties on "finally liquidated" entries without an importer-specific court judgment.
What does "finally liquidated" mean? An entry becomes finally liquidated 180 days after its liquidation date. After that point, CBP claims it has no statutory mechanism to voluntarily reliquidate or refund — even though the Supreme Court declared those same tariffs were collected without legal authority.
This is a 180-degree reversal. CBP's own published IEEPA FAQ previously stated that CAPE would eventually process refunds for finally liquidated entries. Importers who read that FAQ and decided to wait rather than file a lawsuit are now potentially stranded.
In CBP's own words from the motion: "Once an entry is finally liquidated, CBP has no authority to reliquidate or refund money without a court order."
Judge Eaton appears skeptical of this position. At the June 9 hearing, he pushed back on the government's argument that refunds for finally liquidated entries must be limited to importers who have filed their own individual lawsuits and obtained court orders. But the DOJ filed its appeal on June 2, 2026, taking the matter to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit — which could take a year or more to resolve.
Who's at Risk: The Two-Track Importer Universe
The government's appeal has effectively split importers into two categories:
Group 1: Protected Importers
- Filed CAPE Declarations during Phase 1 for eligible entries
- Had entries still unliquidated or liquidated within 80 days at time of filing
- Filed individual lawsuits at the CIT (even if not yet adjudicated)
Group 2: At-Risk Importers
- Have entries that were finally liquidated (180+ days past liquidation) before CAPE launched
- Did NOT file a protest within 180 days of liquidation
- Did NOT file an individual lawsuit at the Court of International Trade
- Were relying on CBP's earlier statements that CAPE would eventually cover all entries
If you're in Group 2, your refund rights are hanging by a thread — specifically, by whether the Federal Circuit upholds or reverses the CIT's "universal" injunction requiring refunds for non-litigants.
The Numbers That Matter
Let's put this in context with hard figures from court filings and CBP testimony:
| Metric | Amount |
|---|---|
| Total IEEPA duties collected | ~$166 billion |
| Number of importers affected | ~330,000 |
| Number of entries affected | ~53 million |
| Amount queued for CAPE refund | $95 billion+ |
| Amount actually disbursed (by end of June 2026) | $40 billion+ |
| Estimated exposure for finally liquidated entries | $30 billion+ |
| Entries covered by Phase 1 | ~63% |
| Entries in "finally liquidated" limbo | ~37% |
For a mid-size importer with $2-5 million in IEEPA duties paid across 2025, the difference between having entries in the Phase 1 window versus the "finally liquidated" category could easily be six or seven figures.
What You Should Do Right Now
The clock is ticking. Here's the action plan, in priority order:
-
Audit your entry portfolio immediately — Pull every entry that paid IEEPA duties. Categorize each as: (a) already refunded via CAPE, (b) eligible for Phase 1/2 but not yet filed, or (c) finally liquidated with no pending protest or lawsuit. Your broker should be able to run this report from ACE.
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File Phase 1 CAPE Declarations for any eligible entries you missed — If you have unliquidated entries or entries liquidated within 80 days that you haven't yet submitted, do it now. There's no announced deadline for Phase 1 submissions, but there's no reason to wait.
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Prepare for Phase 2 if you have reconciliation entries — June 29 is days away. Have your broker ready to file CAPE Declarations for reconciliation entries as soon as the system opens.
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Evaluate filing a CIT lawsuit for finally liquidated entries — This is the big one. If you have material dollar exposure in finally liquidated entries, consult a trade attorney about filing an individual action at the Court of International Trade. The cost of filing is a fraction of what's at stake. CBP has explicitly stated that importers with their own CIT judgments will be processed through CAPE once Phase 3 launches.
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Check your protest history — If you filed a timely protest (within 180 days of liquidation) on finally liquidated entries, you may still have a path even without a lawsuit. Review your protest status in ACE.
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Watch for scams — CBP has warned that fraudsters are targeting importers via email and social media, attempting to steal ACE credentials. CAPE Declarations can only be filed through the official ACE Secure Data Portal. Nobody legitimate will ask for your login credentials.
Key Deadlines and What's Coming Next
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| June 29, 2026 | CAPE Phase 2 launches (reconciliation entries) |
| End of July 2026 | CAPE Phase 3 launches (finally liquidated entries — but only for importers with CIT orders, per CBP's current position) |
| TBD (likely 2027) | Federal Circuit ruling on DOJ's appeal of the CIT's universal injunction |
The Federal Circuit appeal is the wildcard. If the appellate court upholds Judge Eaton's universal injunction, CBP will eventually have to process refunds for all finally liquidated entries regardless of whether importers filed individual lawsuits. If the court sides with DOJ, those $30 billion+ in duties may only be recoverable through individual litigation.
In the meantime, Judge Eaton has scheduled additional status conferences and has shown willingness to push CBP on its timeline. But willing judges don't pay invoices — only processed refunds do.
The Bigger Picture: What This Means for Trade Compliance
The IEEPA refund saga is a case study in why proactive customs management matters. Importers who had clean entry records, active ACE accounts, and engaged brokers were positioned to file CAPE Declarations on day one — and many already have their money back. Importers who treated customs as a back-office afterthought are now facing the prospect of hiring trade attorneys to recover funds that are rightfully theirs.
It also highlights a structural reality of U.S. customs law: the liquidation clock doesn't stop ticking just because a regulation is declared unlawful. The 180-day finality window, the 80-day CAPE threshold, the protest deadlines — these aren't arbitrary bureaucratic hurdles. They're the architecture of how CBP operates, and understanding them is the difference between recovering seven figures and writing it off.
If you're managing hundreds or thousands of entries across multiple HTS codes, keeping track of liquidation dates, protest windows, and refund eligibility isn't a spreadsheet exercise — it's exactly the kind of classification and compliance tracking that TariffLens was built to handle.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal, tax, or customs advice. Consult a licensed customs broker or trade attorney for guidance specific to your situation.