On September 10, an American company went to court to get a tariff refund. It argues that some of Trump’s tariffs against China are illegal, and that these duties have cost it dearly. The case, filed by HMTX, a vinyl tile maker, is at the U.S. Court of International Trade (CIT). Win or lose, HMTX has challenged Trump’s narrative about tariffs. Some 3,500 companies are now in the litigation. Congress should pay attention.
HTMX’s complaint calls Trump’s Section 301 tariffs an “unprecedented, unbounded and unlimited trade war.” It says the third and fourth rounds of these tariffs are “untethered to the unfair intellectual property policies” that gave rise to them. Quoting Trump’s tweets, HTMX has a paper trail linking these tariffs to the U.S. “trade imbalance,” China’s “currency manipulation” and the flow of fentanyl from China. HTMX insists these motives were never part of the original Section 301 investigation, are unrelated to China’s theft of intellectual property and don’t offer a legal basis for Trump to have “wildly expanded the scope of tariffs.” The company thus feels it is owed a refund.
HTMX has to like the fact that the CIT ruled in July for Transpacific Steel. That case was triggered by Trump’s national security tariffs. Transpacific imports Turkish steel, which was hit by a higher tariff than steel from other countries targeted by Section 232. Transpacific insisted Turkey’s higher tariff lacked any “nexus to national security.” The CIT didn’t go this far, but did rule there was “no procedurally proper” finding of Turkey’s greater threat to the United States. Continue reading.