IEEPA Tariff Refunds: How to File Through CBP's CAPE System Before Your Entries Age Out

CBP has already paid out more than $35 billion in IEEPA tariff refunds, and the agency puts total eligible claims at roughly $166 billion. If your company imported goods subject to the Liberation Day tariffs or the fentanyl/trafficking tariffs between April 2025 and their termination date, you almost certainly have money owed to you. Getting it back isn't automatic, and for some entries, a clock is running.

This is a practical guide to how the refund process works, which entries qualify under Phase 1 right now, and what you should do for the entries that don't.

What the Court Did and What It Covers

On February 20, 2026, the Supreme Court held 6-3 in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump and Trump v. V.O.S. Selections, Inc. that IEEPA does not authorize the President to impose tariffs. The ruling invalidated two sets of tariffs:

Liberation Day tariffs — the "reciprocal tariffs" first imposed in April 2025, set at a minimum 10% on most trading partners and significantly higher on specific countries (34% on Chinese-origin goods under that emergency).

Fentanyl/trafficking tariffs — the 25% tariffs on most Canadian and Mexican goods and the 10% tariff on Chinese goods, imposed under a separate declared fentanyl emergency.

What's not being refunded matters as much as what is. Section 301 tariffs on Chinese goods (7.5%–25% under Lists 1–4A) were imposed under a different legal authority entirely, Trade Act of 1974 Section 301, and are not affected by this ruling. AD/CVD orders are also untouched. IEEPA duties only.

Take an importer who paid stacked duties on Chinese machinery: 25% Section 301 plus 34% Liberation Day IEEPA plus 10% fentanyl IEEPA. Only the 44 IEEPA percentage points are eligible for refund. See China tariff stacking for context on how these layers combined.

Phase 1: The CAPE System

CBP built a new ACE tool called CAPE (Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries) to manage what is likely the largest customs refund operation in US history. It launched April 20, 2026, and is the primary mechanism CBP supports for IEEPA refund requests outside of the protest system. CBP maintains the current CAPE guidance and FAQ at cbp.gov/trade/programs-administration/trade-remedies/ieepa-duty-refunds.

Phase 1 covers approximately 63% of affected entries:

All unliquidated entries (entries CBP hasn't finalized yet)
Entries liquidated within the prior 80 days

The CAPE Declaration itself is simpler than the name suggests. It's a CSV file listing entry numbers. That's the only data field required. You upload it through the "CAPE" tab in your ACE Portal account.

Two Setup Steps You Can't Skip

Before you can submit a CAPE Declaration, two things need to be in place:

1. ACE Portal account. The CAPE Declaration can only be submitted by the IOR or the licensed customs broker who filed the original entries. Confirm your broker has an active ACE Secure Data Portal account and that your company's account is current if you're filing directly.

2. Banking information under the Importer sub-account. CBP is issuing all IEEPA refunds by ACH. Paper checks are not available. To receive payment, you must have banking details entered under the "Importer" sub-account in the ACE Portal. This doesn't happen automatically. If the bank account isn't loaded before your CAPE Declaration is accepted, your refund has nowhere to go. Do this first.

Once both are set up, a broker can include up to 9,999 entries across multiple importers in a single CAPE Declaration.

Processing Timeline

CBP expects to issue valid refunds within 60–90 days of accepting a CAPE Declaration, unless an entry triggers a compliance review. Refunds are net: CBP will offset any duty deficiencies on the same entry before sending the remainder. Don't expect a surprise windfall on an entry that was already under review for undervaluation.

The 80-Day Clock

The 80-day window isn't a fixed deadline for filing. It's a rolling eligibility threshold. An entry that liquidated yesterday qualifies. The same entry, 81 days after liquidation, falls out of Phase 1 and into Phase 2 territory, which CBP has described as coming in "summer 2026" but hasn't launched yet.

That rolling nature creates ongoing urgency: entries liquidating right now should go into CAPE Declarations soon rather than waiting until Phase 2 is available. You don't know how long Phase 2 will take, and you don't need to wait for it on entries that are still within Phase 1's window.

For entries already past 80 days, there are still paths:

Protest under 19 USC § 1514 — if the entry liquidated within the past 180 days, you can file a protest. The 180-day protest clock runs from the date of liquidation, not the 80-day Phase 1 window. Protests for IEEPA refunds have been accepted by CBP as valid grounds.

Court of International Trade — for entries more than 180 days post-liquidation, there's no administrative remedy left. CIT litigation is the only avenue, and it's slow and expensive. The practical reality is that most importers won't pursue it for any single entry.

Phase 1 Exclusions

Even if an entry is unliquidated or within 80 days, it's excluded from Phase 1 if it's:

An entry with an open protest
A reconciliation entry (or the underlying flagged entries)
A drawback entry
An AD/CVD entry pending liquidation

The open protest exclusion creates a specific decision point. If you filed protests solely to preserve IEEPA refund rights before CAPE launched (a common protective move), CBP permits you to withdraw that protest and add those entries to a CAPE Declaration. The CAPE route is faster than waiting for protest resolution. But only withdraw protests that cover nothing other than IEEPA refunds. A protest that also covers a classification dispute, valuation adjustment, or any other issue must stay in place; withdrawing it abandons those other grounds too.

The Section 122 Complication

When the Supreme Court struck down IEEPA in February, the administration responded the same day by invoking Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974 to impose a 10% temporary global tariff on imports from most countries. On May 7, 2026, the Court of International Trade ruled that the Section 122 tariffs were also unlawful; the court found that the conditions required by the statute were not satisfied.

That ruling's practical impact is narrow. The CIT's relief was limited to the three named plaintiffs: Burlap & Barrel, Inc., Basic Fun, Inc., and the State of Washington. Then, on May 12, the Federal Circuit issued an administrative stay suspending the CIT's order while the appeal proceeds.

As of today, the 10% Section 122 tariff is still being collected. Other importers have no current entitlement to refunds on Section 122 duties.

Whether the Section 122 tariffs fall depends on how the Federal Circuit resolves the appeal. If they do, a second refund wave would follow. Filing CAPE Declarations for Section 122 entries now won't accomplish anything; that mechanism isn't open yet. But if you're an importer who filed a protest to preserve Section 122 refund rights, don't withdraw it; it's the only protective tool available for those entries right now.

Practical Priorities Right Now

If you haven't started on CAPE yet, the sequence that matters:

Verify your ACE Portal account is active and that banking information is in the Importer sub-account.
Pull your entry list for IEEPA-duty entries from your broker or your ACE account.
Identify which entries are unliquidated or liquidated within the past 80 days — these go into Phase 1 CAPE now.
For entries liquidated 81–180 days ago: file protests under 19 USC § 1514 immediately. The 180-day window is absolute.
For open protests filed solely for IEEPA purposes: evaluate whether withdrawing and substituting a CAPE Declaration is faster. It usually is.
Don't confuse Section 301 duties with IEEPA duties when pulling refund estimates. The 301 layer isn't recoverable.

The IEEPA tariff background is useful context if your team needs to explain to leadership which duties are in scope. Our IEEPA tariffs explainer covers the legal history in more detail if you're unfamiliar with how these tariffs were originally structured.

Key Takeaways

CBP has already paid over $35 billion in IEEPA refunds; total eligible claims are estimated at $166–$175 billion based on CBP and Penn Wharton figures.
CAPE Phase 1 (live since April 20, 2026) covers unliquidated entries and entries liquidated within 80 days. The CAPE Declaration is a CSV of entry numbers — upload it in ACE Portal after loading bank account information under the Importer sub-account.
The 80-day window is rolling: entries liquidating now are still eligible, but they won't be indefinitely. File sooner rather than waiting on Phase 2.
Entries liquidated 81–180 days ago can still be preserved via protest under 19 USC § 1514; the 180-day clock from liquidation is the hard limit for that path.
Open protests filed solely for IEEPA refund purposes can be withdrawn and replaced with a CAPE Declaration for faster processing — but don't withdraw protests covering other issues.
Section 301 tariffs on China (7.5%–25%) are not affected by the Supreme Court ruling and are not being refunded. Only IEEPA duty layers are in scope.
The Section 122 10% tariff is still being collected as of May 16 due to the Federal Circuit's May 12 administrative stay. Preserve protest rights on Section 122 entries — don't sit on those.

Once you know which entries are in scope for IEEPA refunds, verifying the HTS codes on those entries is worth doing before you submit. A misclassified entry may have overpaid or underpaid the base rate, and CBP nets those against your refund. Check your HTS codes at TariffClassify.