Trump administration just handed out $100,000,000,000 in ‘Liberation Day’ tariff refunds, but another massive payout is trapped in a review

US Customs and Border Protection has processed and paid out $100 billion in Liberation Day tariff refunds to businesses across the country, according to a report from the BBC. That total represents roughly 60 percent of all tariff revenue the government collected under the policy, which was ultimately challenged and struck down in court. A significant portion of the remaining money is still caught in a bureaucratic bottleneck.

The refunds trace back to a Supreme Court ruling issued on February 20, 2026, in which the court decided 6-3 that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act does not grant the president the power to unilaterally impose tariffs of indefinite scope, a decision detailed by the Penn Wharton Budget Model. The court did not explicitly order immediate refunds, but the ruling effectively classified the collected tariffs as illegal, opening the door for businesses to file claims.

Importers generally have 180 days after their goods are liquidated to protest the charges and request their money back from Customs and Border Protection. The scale of the remaining claims is substantial. Nearly $29 billion in potential refunds is currently undergoing review by trade authorities, according to recent court filings, while another $1.6 billion remains stuck because the importers involved have not yet supplied the banking details needed to process payment.

The refunds trace back to costs many businesses passed on to shoppers

Tariffs function as taxes on foreign goods entering the country, and they are not paid by foreign governments or overseas exporters. Instead, domestic businesses and importers pay them as soon as goods arrive at customs, and those higher upfront costs are often passed along to consumers through higher retail prices.

The White House had cited the 1977 IEEPA law, which allows the president to regulate trade in response to an emergency, to justify the tariffs. The measures drew immediate pushback from firms facing a sudden rise in shipment taxes, along with concern that the costs would raise prices for everyday consumers, concerns that echoed elsewhere in the news cycle this week amid a public back-and-forth with Sanders over the direction of the party’s economic messaging.

Some major corporations have already begun to see the impact of the refunds. Amazon received about $600 million during the second quarter, and finance chief Brian Olsavsky said on the company’s earnings call that some of that money would go back to customers where specific charges applied, while the rest would support lower store prices.

Because of how customs law is structured, only the importers who directly paid the tariffs are eligible to claim refunds, meaning any relief for individual consumers depends entirely on the businesses themselves passing savings along. Retailers have leaned into consumer-facing promotions elsewhere too, including a new Crocs-themed Happy Meal that McDonald’s rolled out this week.

Following the February ruling, the Trump administration introduced a 10 percent universal tariff as a temporary measure. Those measures expired last month and have since been replaced by a new set of tariffs on 60 trading partners, based on claims that those partners have failed to properly address forced labor.

The Penn Wharton Budget Model had projected before the ruling that reversing the IEEPA tariffs could generate up to $175 billion in total refunds, and Customs and Border Protection reported collecting approximately $133.5 billion in tariffs under that authority as of December 14, 2025.