At a show cause hearing before the U.S. Court of International Trade (“CIT”) on June 9, 2026, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”) confirmed that it will roll out Phases 2 and 3 of its process for refunding duties paid by importers under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (“IEEPA”) later this summer, with Phase 2 scheduled to launch on June 29, 2026, and Phase 3 expected by the end of July.
Phase 2: Reconciliation Entries
At the hearing, Susan Thomas, CBP’s Executive Assistant Commissioner for Trade, explained that Phase 2 of the IEEPA tariff refund process, known as the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (“CAPE”), will cover reconciliation entries. Her testimony, delivered after the CIT issued an order withdrawing its earlier requirement that CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott appear, was consistent with the agency’s June 4, 2026 response to the CIT’s May 27, 2026 show cause order, which the court issued amid concerns over the CAPE’s rollout (see Update of June 1, 2026).
Phase 3: Finally Liquidated Entries
Thomas further revealed that CBP is developing Phase 3 of the CAPE to cover finally liquidated entries, with deployment expected approximately one month after Phase 2.
Thomas, however, did not clarify whether Phase 3 will be limited to finally liquidated entries—entries that have completed both the 314-day liquidation cycle and the 180-day protest period during which importers may challenge CBP’s final duty assessment—or whether the phase will also include non-finally liquidated entries outside the scope of Phase 1 of the CAPE.
Consistent with the Trump administration’s June 2, 2026 appeal of the IEEPA tariff refund process, Thomas and CBP reiterated their position that the agency cannot issue refunds on finally liquidated entries absent a lawsuit by an importer of record seeking IEEPA tariff refunds before the CIT (see Update of June 3, 2026). As a result, both the scope of Phase 3 and which importers will be eligible to participate remain unclear.
Background
CBP unveiled the CAPE in a March 12, 2026 declaration to the CIT, confirming that the IEEPA tariff refund process would be implemented in multiple phases (see Update of March 13, 2026). So far, importers seeking IEEPA tariff refunds have been limited to participating in Phase 1 of the CAPE, which CBP introduced in a March 31, 2026 declaration to the CIT and covers refunds of IEEPA tariffs collected on unliquidated entries and entries no more than 80 days past liquidation (see Update of April 3, 2026 and Update of April 10, 2026).