The tariffs, set at 10% or 12.5%, apply to goods from 86 countries and cover 99.4% of US imports. The administration says they respond to countries’ failure to enforce bans on trade in goods made with forced labor.
Pratik Shah, the attorney for the small businesses, told the panel the law requires country-specific findings and that the administration’s use of Section 301 was unprecedented in its breadth and speed. One judge pushed back, asking whether extra motives matter if a forced-labor rationale exists. The Justice Department maintains that the US Trade Representative acted within the law and in line with the president’s aim of tying access to the US market to action against forced-labor goods.
A third legal fight in two years,The Supreme Court In February it struck down the “reciprocal” tariffs unveiled in April 2025, forcing refunds of more than $100 billion.Section 122: A 10% global tariff followed under this part of the Trade Act of 1974, which limits such tariffs to 150 days. The trade court ruled against it, but an appeals court paused that ruling, so the tariffs stayed until they expired in July.Section 301: The new tariffs took effect as those expired
The panel will issue a written opinion, and any decision could be appealed to the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. In late July, Trump told Fox News the new tariffs do the same job as the ones the Supreme Court struck down. Sara Albrecht of the Liberty Justice Center, a nonprofit behind one of the lawsuits, said the remark strengthens the plaintiffs’ case.
