Section 122 refunds: the other tariff refund pool, and why nobody is being paid yet

The short answer: a 10% import surcharge under Section 122 of the Trade Act ran from February 24 to July 24, 2026. The Court of International Trade held it unlawful on May 7. But the ruling reached only three plaintiffs, the Federal Circuit stayed it on June 11, and no CBP refund process exists. As of August 30, 2026, nobody is being refunded. For most importers the deadlines that matter haven’t started running yet, and that is exactly why now is the time to get organized.

Most of the refund attention this year has gone to the IEEPA tariffs, where the Supreme Court ruled and CBP is processing refunds under court supervision. This piece is about the second pool: smaller, newer, and, unlike the first one, currently administered by nobody.

What Proclamation 11012 actually was

On February 20, 2026, the Supreme Court decided Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, holding that IEEPA does not authorize tariffs. The same day, the President ended the IEEPA duties and signed Proclamation 11012, invoking Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 (19 U.S.C. 2132), the statute that lets a President impose a temporary import surcharge of up to 15% for up to 150 days in “fundamental international payments problems.” The proclamation set 10%, in addition to all other duties, on goods entered for consumption from 12:01 a.m. EST February 24, 2026 through 12:01 a.m. EDT July 24, 2026 (91 FR 9339). It was the fallback tariff, and it lapsed on schedule: extending it would have required an Act of Congress, and no Federal Register document extends it.

What it was not: check whether you even paid it

The circulating claim that the surcharge hit “nearly all imports” is wrong, and chasing a refund on duties you never paid wastes everyone’s time. Paragraph 14 of the proclamation excluded thirteen categories, including everything already subject to Section 232 tariffs, goods entered duty-free from Canada or Mexico under USMCA, pharmaceuticals and their ingredients, certain electronics, passenger vehicles and certain parts, aerospace products, energy, certain critical minerals and agricultural products, and DR-CAFTA duty-free textiles. It also did not stack on Section 232: where a 232 tariff covered part of an import, the surcharge applied only to the uncovered part. There was a four-day in-transit carve-out at the start. Step one of any Section 122 review is pulling the entries from the window and confirming the surcharge was actually assessed.

What the court actually decided on May 7

In Oregon v. United States and Burlap and Barrel, Inc. v. United States (CIT Slip Op. 26-47), a three-judge panel held the proclamation ultra vires: it justified the surcharge with trade and current-account deficits, and Section 122 as Congress wrote it in 1974 requires balance-of-payments deficits in the older, narrower sense. In the court’s words, “Nowhere does Proclamation No. 11012 identify balance-of-payments deficits within the meaning of Section 122 as it was enacted in 1974.”

Then comes the part almost every summary gets wrong. The court dismissed 23 of the 24 state plaintiffs for lack of standing, declined to decide whether it even could issue universal relief, and refused to grant it anyway: “the court declines to enter a universal injunction.” Relief went to three plaintiffs only: the State of Washington, Burlap and Barrel, Inc., and Basic Fun, Inc., who were awarded an injunction and refunds with interest. Nobody else’s duties were touched.

The stay chronology that changes everything

• May 12, 2026: the Federal Circuit entered an immediate administrative stay while it considered the government’s stay motion. (Not the real stay, despite widespread reporting.)
• May 20, 2026: the CIT itself denied the government’s motion to stay the judgment, all three judges concurring (Slip Op. 26-53).
• June 11, 2026: the Federal Circuit granted the stay pending appeal, per curiam, in the consolidated appeals (No. 26-1804).

The consequence, stated plainly: as of August 30, 2026, the judgment and the refund order are suspended, so even the three winners are not being paid. The appeal is in merits briefing (the government’s opening brief was filed July 29; amicus briefing ran into August). There is no argument date and no ruling, and predicting the timing would be guessing.

The clock that matters, and why it hasn’t started

The proclamation directed that the surcharge “be treated as a regular customs duty,” which means the ordinary machinery applies: liquidation, then protest. For a protest of the rate and amount of duties, the law is specific: it may be filed “within 180 days after but not before” liquidation (19 U.S.C. 1514(c)(3)). Most Section 122 entries have not liquidated yet. An entry ordinarily liquidates within a year (or is deemed liquidated at the importer’s asserted amounts), so the surcharge window’s entries reach that point roughly February through July 2027. But CBP can extend liquidation, a year at a time, up to three years, and the CIT itself noted CBP can use extensions to protect its ability to collect if the government wins the appeal. Expect extension notices, not early refunds.

Two practical anchors:

1. The posting is the trigger. Liquidation notice is electronic, posted on cbp.gov, and that posting date is the legal evidence of liquidation. Each entry’s 180-day protest window runs from its own posting, not from a courtesy notice and not from any court ruling.
2. Illustrative outer math, not a calendar entry: if CBP neither extends nor suspends, the earliest deemed liquidations land around February 2027 and the earliest protest deadlines around late August 2027, stretching into early 2028 for the last entries. Actual dates depend entirely on when each entry actually liquidates. Track the postings; don’t calendar the arithmetic.

How claims are being preserved

The protest route. A protest can contest “the classification and rate and amount of duties chargeable,” including the legality of the orders behind the assessment (19 CFR 174.11). Your broker can file it as your authorized agent, and one protest can cover many entries when they share the same protesting party, category of merchandise, and common decision, which matters for a surcharge spread across five months of entries.

The court route. Importers are also filing directly at the Court of International Trade under its residual jurisdiction. Those cases are being stayed behind the Federal Circuit appeal with refund claims expressly preserved: in American Dawn, Inc. v. United States, the court stayed proceedings in July “without prejudice to American Dawn’s claims for refund of the Section 122 duties it has paid, with interest.” Two constraints deserve respect here: the two-year limitations period on such actions (28 U.S.C. 2636(i)), and standing, which is a real barrier; it eliminated 23 states in this very case. For importers with large exposure, whether to file a protective action is a conversation to have with customs counsel before the clocks get close.

What does not exist, said plainly

No CBP refund process, claim form, or portal for Section 122 duties has been established. No Federal Register notice from CBP, USTR, or the ITC creates one. No Federal Circuit ruling exists. The absence is the news: a five-month, 10% surcharge was held unlawful and there is, today, no administrative path to the money. What exists is the ordinary protest machinery and a pending appeal.

What we’re doing for clients this month

Identifying every entry in the February 24 to July 23, 2026 window that carried the surcharge (net of the thirteen exclusion categories), confirming each entry’s liquidation status, watching for extension notices, and calendaring 180 days from each actual liquidation posting. For importers with heavy exposure, we coordinate with customs counsel on protective filings. None of it is glamorous. All of it is the difference between having a claim and having a story about one.

Everything above is current as of August 30, 2026 and describes a live, moving appeal; it’s general information, not legal advice on any specific entry. If you want your Section 122 exposure mapped, ask us, and you can estimate current tariff layers on any product with our tariff simulator.

Sources

• Proclamation 11012, 91 FR 9339 (Feb. 25, 2026)
• CIT Slip Op. 26-47, Oregon v. United States (May 7, 2026)
• CIT Slip Op. 26-53 (May 20, 2026)
• Fed. Cir. No. 26-1804, State of Oregon v. Trump (stay granted June 11, 2026)
• 19 U.S.C. 1514(c)(3); 19 CFR 174; 19 CFR 159.11-159.12