1w ago

If Trump loses his tariff lawsuit, America may have to refund businesses more than $200 billion

www.cnn.com

If Trump loses his tariff lawsuit, America may have to refund businesses more than $200 billion | CNN Business

The majority of the sweeping tariffs Donald Trump imposed during his second term face one final litmus test that will determine whether he can continue to levy them – and also whether businesses are eligible for massive refunds.

That potentially dramatic turn in the tariff saga comes after a federal appeals court ruled on Friday that Trump unlawfully leaned on the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose across-the-board duties on countries.

Trump had used those powers to push import tax rates as high as 50% on India and Brazil – and as high as 145% on China earlier this year.

162 comments

Spoiler alert: even if Donny loses this battle he won’t pay anyone anything he never has and never will admit to losing or owning anything to anyone.
- It's not Donny's money. What will happen is that importers will pass the tariffs onto consumers, as they pretty much have to, then the tariffs will be overturned and the money given back to importers, thus robbing regular people once again and transferring wealth to the capitalists.
  
  I doubt the importers will be refunded. Obviously if they were, 90%+ will not refund their customers because why would they? I can imagine class action lawsuits down the road, but honestly I predict the supreme court will overturn any lower court rulings and let him tariff away, saying it's the congress's job to reign him in since "it's their prerogative" or some such, in a 6-3 ruling. If they wanted to stop the tariffs, the majority will argue, they could simply cancel them.
- That's right. He won't pay us back because he has already launder the money into his own pocket
Am I getting a refund on the higher prices I'm paying because of tariffs?
- The tariffs will go away, but the companies have realised that you're okay with paying $10 for something that used to cost $8 anyway so you'll be paying $10 from now on
  
  The only solution is to confiscate all wealth over $100 million, and use it to establish Health Care 4 All, free college/trade, UBI, minimum living wage, public services, etc.
  
  I'll just remind everyone that the people making those ghoulish decisions have home addresses. Just normal homes in normal neighborhoods, most often without any extra security.
  Be a shame if they suddenly realized there were consequences for social murder.
  
  Until they decide to change it again in 3-6 months.
  
  They've been shrinkflating the shit out of everything so much.
  I've recently noticed a stick of deodorant from Costco seems to be the same (already shrunken over the years) plastic shell with less actual deodorant in it.
- lol
- Nah you get the bill citizen. Don't worry, glorious leader will have another illegal act for you to pay the fine for soon too
- yeah its like fuck that. do like the covid checks.
All that money will go to the businesses, you’ll get a coupon for $1 off and a free credit check.
- Wouldn't surprise if this is part of the scam. Put on tarrifs, hike prices. Let the customer pay and then give companies a rebate with tax money. So the average citizen is charged twice. And of course those price hikes will only go partially down. So the consumer keeps getting screwed.
  
  Soon "See, this is yet another example of why we can't trust the government to do anything right and why we should defund and shutter all of our public institutions." - moderate pundit on well respected mainstream news channel
  
  The average citizen is charged more than twice when you consider that they're paying a much higher tax rate than the ultra-wealthy.
  
  Hmm, sounds like politics made for billionaires, hmmm.
  
  You think the price hikes are going down? Lol
  
  It is. Trump has his own stablecoin. That means he needs to hold massive $ reserves. So high rates due to lots of government debt are good for Trump.
- And they'll continue to raise prices. It will become the new "supply chain issues".
People haven't caught on to the grift yet. One of the people in the committee who runs the tariff decisions literally runs a financial/law institution that since the tariffs started, has been contracting with companies to pay a portions (10, 20, 40%) of the tariffs to "ease the load on the companies" but they retain the rights, in the case of what is going on i.e. tariffs being recalled and paid back, to take 100% of the tariff payback.
So a government official is steering the tariff policy to essentially steal money from companies with some alight risk of the tariffs not getting overturned. Crazy grift.
- If you have a source for that could you post it?
  
  Sure
  https://www.wired.com/story/cantor-fitzgerald-trump-tariff-refunds/
  https://thedeepdive.ca/howard-lutnicks-sons-running-his-old-firm-are-betting-against-trump-tariffs/
How far does this refund go? My distributor paid the tarrifs and then passed that cost onto me, which I passed onto my customers.
Will my customers, distributors, or myself be refunded? I assume just my distributor since they directly paid the tarrif. And I doubt prices will come down when tarrifs end, so everything is permanently more expensive for no fucking reason, and the top middle man just boosted his profit margin through the roof.
- So that would mean that the Trump tariffs were sending American money overseas for no reason. I doubt it'll actually happen, but holy shit is Trump an incompetent idiot.
  
  No, the US company recieving the import pays the tarrif to the US government.
  But yes, Trump is an idiot.
  
  This was abundantly clear since he was on Howard stern in the 80’s haha
  
  Yes, yes he is and that was abundantly clear from his first term. But at least the female POC didn't get in, right? Dodged a bullet there.
  /s of course
- What are you distributing?
  
  I'm a locksmith, I mostly program car keys for customers. Basically every car key is produced overseas.
Eehhh, consumers paid this, not the businesses. This way businesses would essentially get a bonus
- That's the point of Republican business support. Remember COVID, where businesses got money to "survive"?
- Well, consumers paid first and foremost, but businesses lost revenue because consumers kinda stop buying shit when it doubles in price - other than essentials, of course. It's also easier to pay a bunch of businesses than to pay 300 million Americans. Oh wait, they've already done the latter, so how about do that again and people can spend the money to buy more shit from said businesses and everyone wins?
So the idiot who managed to ruin every business he ever owned created an absolute clusterfuck running the US, who could've known?
- Hey now, he only serially ruined businesses in order to enrich himself. Dodging taxes and shit like that makes him a good businessman, actually. Just ask my old boss. He'll tell you all about trump's genius business acumen in excruciating detail all day long. Yes, he does own his own business, no it's not doing well but he's got a corvette, so he's pretty sure he's right.
- Points for consistency? 🤷‍♂️
None of us will see any money refunded. Remember that this is all planned out to make products more expensive for americans, so we get used to the higher prices. Then the companies with hundreds of millions in profit can make more profit when costs for them go down, they keep our prices the same and also SHRINK the size of the product.
Corporations are stealing from Americans every day and politicians are all in on the scam, so no one will do anything about it.
- "Look, we lowered prices!" -- ignoring that the new "lower" prices are still higher than the pre-tariff prices.
Oh so we get to pay twice then. Great.
We're never fucking financially recovering from this administration
- They always claim they are the party of financial responsibility. Lets see how responsible they'll handle it.
  I assume they will do like with their self-proclaimed "law and order" image, with which they put a felon in the White House, and where the AG is busy obstructing justice by wiping Republicans from a list of pedophiles instead of actually fighting crime.
how would refund like this even work? Many businesses closed shop entirely due to these tarrifs, could they sue the government too? This would be crazy and this massive overhead risk could block the entire thing.
- This is why huge policy changes are discussed and planned for years. One guy being able say "Tariffs starting on Monday!" is fucking idiotic.
  
  Yuuuuuup! One of the key parts of planning policies is evaluating its strength in court. SCOTUS gave the executive branch a free pass to just try anything with zero consequences. Why bother asking if something is legal when it literally doesn't matter if it isn't.
- Most likely the only ones getting refunds are those joined to the law suit that got the tariffs removed. Everyone else is SOL.
- No refunds, sorry.
Surely the price hikes will reverse at that point and won't just remain higher indefinitely causing another price/price inflationary spiral.
- The companies importing products sold their debt to massive debt collecting firms who will receive the rebate so no.
much like all the other illegal shit dumpy mcshitpants has done, who is gonna tell him he can't have his big boy tariffs?
Never mind the consumers eh? WE are the ones most directly affected. Businesses lost nothing
- plenty of businesses literally closed FYI
  
  To avoid paying tarrifs
When do Trump and the magats drink the poison koolaid? I’m getting impatient
- I don't think that happens until command gets forced into the bunker and the army is defeated.
  
  75-85 million people died before that happened
- Hoping for Trumplethinskin to kick the bucket soon. It'll be a doozy. I can barely contain myself watching the news of him looking decrepit.
And the prices? Oh nothing will fundamentally change 😉
How much of that will be pocketed by his cronies because the rules for payout were vague enough for their random LLC.
- Lutnick's company has been literally buying up claims to these tariff refunds for pennies on the dollar.
  https://www.wired.com/story/cantor-fitzgerald-trump-tariff-refunds/
- Pretty sure refunded tariffs will be based on transactions and... Yeah you are right nevermind.
Around $6000 to my small business. I’m sure the Supreme Court will side with Trump though.
Trump asks Supreme Court to quickly take up tariffs case and reverse ruling finding them illegal
- AKA: Trump's standard delaying tactic whenever he gets ruled against.
  Appeal everything no matter how ridiculous, just to waste time and allow him to keep doing whatever shitty thing for a few more months/years until all appeal venues are exhausted.
And then the businesses will pass that refund onto the consumer, right?... Right?
Seeing that our Judicial branch is limping along, and at least attempting to curtail this march toward totalitarianism, gives me hope.
I'll be pleasantly surprised if this happens.
- He regularly ignores court orders with zero consequences. He has empirically proven that the courts can say whatever they want but he doesn’t have to listen.
Art of the deal?
- Only that the artist is none.
He’s already spent it on bling from Kohl’s.
Thanks CNN. Now the Supreme Court justices know their asking price
Private sector vs public sector ... in the US ... Okay ...........
Those businesses will never see a goddamn cent
The money will go back to American businesses, which means American consumers. That means that's more proof that Americans are paying for the tariffs.
- Not a single cent will go to American consumers. If the American companies win this lawsuit (and don't get me wrong, they should), they will keep the money and will not lower their prices even after the tariffs are removed.
  
  Oh for sure, I'm just saying that the money going back to American businesses proves that this isn't hurting foreign companies and we're paying for the tariffs.
Hopefully this means i might be able to get an Xpeng. Tired of waiting for our manufacturers to catch up.
Can you imagine having to refund ~6 months of US Imports? The paperwork alone would take years. Each entry would have to be re-verified with customs. Not to mention the staffing increase for CBP to process the refunds. I don't see SCOTUS not enforcing this.
Not only will the consumers never see a dime of any of the money if it's refunded, the companies aren't going to lower prices because you've already absorbed the price shock.
- See: the gas price jump in 2008-ish
- Right. Everything today is about softening you up. They say, we will kill you—and you panic—then they roll it back to just losing an arm, and you’re happy about it.
  
  This is called "price anchoring" when used in business. They throw out an outrageously high number to start and then follow it up with something less to make it seem like a good deal when that was really the price they wanted all along.
  
  Alas, a lot people have already lost an arm and a leg and there's still no end in sight.
  
  Like a frog in boiling water.
- Ianal, I really hope there is some sort of class action that can be done to force companies to pass that back to consumers.
  It should be easy enough to pass through to all the electronic pay methods.
  Or force markup items to all be put on massive sale until an equal amount has been sold to make up the sales at markup.
  There are no perfect solutions, some people will still make out like bandits.
  But jfc, just releasing billions to these companies will only benefit the C-Level and maybe some shareholders, the people already benefiting, not the ones feeling the pain.
  
  A class action just passes the money from one elite class (corporations) to another (class action lawyers). Consumers will get a virtual prepaid debit card for $1.97 in 5 years that can’t be spent anywhere because it can’t be used online and it costs $5 to have them mail you a physical card
  Should get out guillotines
- Yeah I feel like this was already expected or part of some master plan. The companies didn’t lose because they passed it on to the consumer and then they’re gonna get money on top of it.
  
  I feel like this was already expected or part of some master plan
  OMG stop. We've elected conspiracy theorists already and things are going to shit. We need to stop conspiratorial thinking.
That money should go to us because the business passed the price increases on to us!
- The businesses will raise a lawsuit that the money is theirs and you will lose again.
  
  And the prices won't go back down.
- Congress: "Sorry, best we can do is another tax break for the rich."
- Fuck corpos
- This exactly.
Small businesses, back of the line. Gotta make sure those billionaires don't lose out first.
- Wouldn't bring back the small businesses that have already been killed anyway. My favorite coffee shop just closed, and my independent artisan friends are barely selling anything any more.
Was it not the end consumer who paid those tariffs?? Frankly, I'd rather it be given back to the business at least, but let's not pretend that they didn't extract it from their customers. End it so that other companies can't as easily gouge based on the idea of tariffs.
- Depends in the incoterms. Mostly it's the us importer.
- Yes, the business just collected it. However, it would also depend on whether they upped their prices to do so.
  
  (they did)
- Was it not the end consumer who paid those tariffs?
  It is whomever imported the item that pays. If you order directly from a tariffed country you pay. If American_Business_01 imports stuff they pay, they then either eat the tariff, raise their price to retailers and distribution (this is what is happening in the non-video game industry). Some businesses are raising MSRP and spreading the tariff between themselves, distribution, retailers, and consumers. Some companies are trying to dump it all on retailers by not raising msrp.
$200 billion / 330 million Americans = $606 each. More or less.
- And that's just the illegal tariffs.
The Businesses didn't pay the tariffs, We did.
Increasing the uncertainty is not necessarily beneficial either. Businesses won't want to keep changing their pricing. People don't want to plan their purchases around whether tariffs are likely to change up or down in the future. Their instinct will be to wait.
The tariffs were illegal in how they were implemented but Congress could easily do it and would follow his instructions as they have done before.
It's a shit show, as expected.
- Uh congress couldn’t easily implement tariffs though. How would they muster 60 votes in the senate to break the filibuster?
  
  You have more faith in the democrats than I do. They won't filibuster tariffs with a shutdown looming that is clearly trumps causing, but they don't want the blame.
No worries , you have a supreme court good at ruling by vibe.
Republicans are so fucking stupid. They imposed a stupid tax on all of us.
- No. That was their plan. They know what they're doing. Republican voters are the dumb ones.
Yeah F that.
American consumers need to get the refund, not the corporations.
Turns out either I can't read or can't math.
~~Funny how the refund works out to a total of about 60 cents per American, when I know I've paid WAY more than that in tariff-related bullshit.~~
- 60 cents? You may have confused "billion" for "million" somewhere, unless I'm misunderstanding you, in which case we'd be talking closer to $600
  
  Whoops, you're right! Thanks :)
Or else what?
It shouldn’t go back to businesses, it should be a tax credit (with documentation.)
Cool. Can other countries sue for the damage it caused to their industries as well?
Don't worry, the supremes will make it all go away.

162 comments