The Supreme Court struck down the tariffs behind an estimated $166 to $179 billion in duties on February 20, 2026 (Holland & Knight, 2026). If that sounds like the end of the tariff era, it wasn’t. Within hours the administration had a replacement running under different legal authority, and as of early August 2026, importers are still paying tariffs, just under laws the ruling never touched. This is a tracker of what actually died, what replaced it, and what was never at risk.
Key Takeaways
- The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 on February 20, 2026 that IEEPA doesn’t authorize tariffs at all, invalidating the “Reciprocal” and “Trafficking and Immigration” tariffs (Holland & Knight, 2026).
- The 10% global replacement tariff under Section 122 expired on its own 150-day clock on July 24, 2026, regardless of a separate court fight over whether it was ever lawful (Skadden, 2026).
- The same day Section 122 expired, new Section 301 tariffs of 10-12.5% took effect on 60 countries covering 99.4% of U.S. imports (Morgan Lewis, 2026).
- Section 232 (steel, aluminum, copper) and Section 338 (a first-ever use, against Canada) were never part of the IEEPA case and remain fully active.
Tariff Authority Explained to a Beginner
“Tariffs” aren’t one law. Every U.S. tariff traces back to a specific statute that gives the president a narrow, defined power, and those statutes have wildly different rules, rate caps, and time limits. IEEPA is an emergency-powers law from 1977 meant for sanctions and asset freezes; using it to impose broad import taxes was a novel legal theory the Supreme Court rejected outright.
Section 301, Section 232, and Section 338, by contrast, are tariff-specific statutes written for exactly this purpose, with their own procedural hoops (investigations, findings, notice periods) that make them slower to invoke but much harder to strike down in court. I’ve found the fastest way to reason about any tariff headline is to ask “which statute is this actually under” before asking what the rate is, because the statute determines whether it’s here to stay.
What Exactly Did the Supreme Court Strike Down?
On February 20, 2026, the Supreme Court ruled that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act does not authorize the president to impose tariffs, striking down both the “Reciprocal Tariffs” and the “Trafficking and Immigration Tariffs” imposed under that law (Holland & Knight, 2026). U.S. Customs and Border Protection halted collection four days later, on February 24.
The ruling left the refund question to lower courts. On March 4, 2026, the Court of International Trade ordered CBP to reliquidate all non-final entries without IEEPA duties in Atmus Filtration, Inc. v. United States, and by March 12 CBP had stood up a refund portal inside its Automated Commercial Environment, called CAPE, for importers and brokers to file claims (Steptoe, 2026).
Lining up the dates shows just how little daylight there was between the ruling and its replacement: the Court ruled on February 20, CBP stopped collecting IEEPA duties on February 24, and a new tariff under a different law was already running that same February 24. Four days, not four months.
Also read: how to file a customs duty reimbursement claim, which covers the CAPE portal alongside the standard CBP protest process and EU/UK equivalents.
Why Did the Section 122 “Replacement” Tariff Also Collapse?
The administration invoked Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 on February 24, 2026, imposing a 10% tariff on goods from every country under a balance-of-payments justification, a power capped at a 15% rate and a strict 150-day limit (Holland & Knight, 2026). It didn’t fare much better legally. The Court of International Trade ruled the Section 122 tariffs unlawful too, and on May 12, 2026, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit entered an administrative stay letting collection continue while the government appealed (Gibson Dunn, 2026).
It’s worth separating two things that get conflated in headlines: a court ruling a tariff unlawful, and a tariff simply expiring on schedule. Section 122’s own 150-day design meant it was set to lapse on July 24, 2026 no matter what the appeal decided. The legal fight over whether those five months of collection were valid is still live, mainly for refund purposes, but it never controlled whether the tariff itself kept running past July.
Also read: what tariffs actually mean and who pays them, which covers how the pass-through cost to U.S. importers works regardless of which statute a given tariff sits under.
What Replaced Section 122 on the Same Day It Expired?
New Section 301 tariffs of 10% or 12.5% took effect on 60 trading partners, together covering roughly 99.4% of U.S. imports, the same day Section 122 expired (Morgan Lewis, 2026). The legal basis is different this time: a USTR investigation opened March 12, 2026 into countries that failed to prohibit or enforce against goods made with forced labor, with findings issued June 2.
Isn’t it striking that a tariff program covering nearly every U.S. trading partner can pivot legal authority overnight without a single day of the “old” rate lapsing for most importers? That continuity is deliberate. Section 301 requires a documented investigation and finding, which takes months, so the administration appears to have run that process in parallel with the Section 122 litigation specifically so a successor was ready the moment the clock ran out.
Exemptions carve out goods already covered by Section 232 (steel, aluminum, autos, copper), plus raw materials, energy products, agricultural goods, and USMCA-qualifying goods, so this isn’t a flat tax on literally everything crossing the border.
Which Tariffs Were Never Touched By Any of This?
Section 232 duties on steel, aluminum, and copper, still generally 50% (25% for the UK), were never part of the IEEPA litigation because they rest on a completely separate national-security statute (Holland & Knight, 2026). A June 1, 2026 proclamation added carve-outs for certain agricultural equipment, industrial equipment from countries with trade deals, and USMCA-qualifying goods, but the base rates held.
Section 338 saw its first use in the modern tariff era on July 20, 2026, when the administration announced 50% duties on a specific list of Canadian goods, including dairy, alcoholic beverages, motor vehicles, furniture, and wine, with no USMCA exemption (White & Case, 2026). It takes effect August 19, 2026, meaning it isn’t collected yet as of this writing.
What Does This Mean If You’re an Importer Right Now?
The practical answer is that “tariffs got struck down” is the wrong headline to plan around. Every shipment now needs a check against at least two, and often three, separate legal authorities before you know the real landed cost.
| Authority | Status (as of Aug 2026) | Typical rate | What it covers |
|---|---|---|---|
| IEEPA | Struck down, refunds processing via CAPE | 0% | N/A (invalidated) |
| Section 122 | Expired on statutory 150-day clock | 0% (was 10%) | Was global |
| Section 301 | Active, replaced Section 122 | 10-12.5% | 60 countries, forced-labor basis |
| Section 232 | Active, unaffected by ruling | 50% (25% UK) | Steel, aluminum, copper, derivatives |
| Section 338 | Active, first-ever use, not yet collected | 50% | Specific Canadian goods, from Aug 19 |
When I’ve walked through this timeline with people outside trade compliance, the reaction is almost always the same: surprise that a Supreme Court loss for the administration translated into, at most, a few days of lower duties before something else took its place. Refund eligibility and current-rate exposure are two completely separate questions, and conflating them is the single most common mistake I see.
For companies actively trying to reduce exposure to this kind of authority-hopping, see how to shift sourcing to lower-tariff countries, which covers legal diversification strategies that don’t depend on any one statute surviving a court challenge.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are IEEPA tariffs completely gone as of August 2026?
Yes, for new imports. The Supreme Court’s February 20, 2026 ruling invalidated the legal basis entirely, and CBP stopped collecting IEEPA duties on February 24 (Holland & Knight, 2026). Whether past payments get refunded is a separate, still-developing process.
Can importers actually get refunds for IEEPA tariffs already paid?
The process exists but isn’t finished. CBP built a refund portal called CAPE inside its Automated Commercial Environment, and the Court of International Trade has ordered reliquidation of non-final entries without IEEPA duties, with an estimated $166-179 billion potentially eligible (Steptoe, 2026).
Is the 10% global tariff still in effect?
No. The Section 122 tariff that replaced IEEPA expired on its own 150-day statutory limit on July 24, 2026, regardless of the separate court fight over its legality (Skadden, 2026). It was replaced the same day by new Section 301 tariffs.
Were China-specific tariffs affected by the IEEPA ruling?
Only partly. IEEPA-based China tariffs (the fentanyl/trafficking tariffs) were struck down, but longstanding Section 301 tariffs on Chinese goods, in place since well before this litigation, were never part of the case and remain active.
What’s the fastest-changing tariff authority to watch right now?
Section 301, by a wide margin. It went from a single-country tool to covering 60 trading partners and 99.4% of U.S. imports within a five-month investigation window, and the administration has shown it will keep opening new Section 301 cases as other authorities run into legal trouble.
Closing
Four legal authorities are now doing what IEEPA used to do alone, and three of them, Section 301, Section 232, and Section 338, were never touched by the Supreme Court’s ruling. Before assuming any product is tariff-free because “the tariffs got struck down,” check it against the current table above by country and HTS code, since the statute that applies is what decides whether that relief is real or temporary.