Importers might be hoping that the broad tariffs imposed on their products by President Trump early this year and last will be tempered in 2026, as consumers find themselves grappling with higher prices. Good luck with that.
With the exception of certain categories such as agriculture, which was granted an exemption from duties for specific farm products late last year, expect tariffs in 2026 to be “actually more and higher — not just continued,” says Ginger Faulk, partner in the international trade law practice, and leader of the U.S. and global sanctions practice, at Eversheds Sutherland.
Faulk acknowledges that many importers will seek refunds for tariffs imposed by Trump under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), in the wake of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling (if the Supreme Court so rules) that such action was not authorized by the law. But the President still has several other statutes to which he could turn, as justification for maintaining tariffs on goods from China and other U.S. trading partners. And relief from the IEEPA tariffs would be a drawn-out process, with no guarantee that petitioners will receive full restitution of the billions of dollars in tariffs that they paid out over 2025.
Traders can expect to feel additional pain this year, Faulk says, as U.S. Customs and Border Protection steps up its enforcement efforts. In particular, the agency is partnering with the U.S. Department of Justice to smoke out fraud by encouraging increased whistleblower action. Last year, DOJ’s Criminal Division launched a whistleblower awards pilot program, which qualifies individuals who report corporate fraud to be awarded up to 30% of the recovered amount.
That effort covers all types of corporate fraud, but the Trump Administration has placed a particular target on trade. DOJ has also joined with the Department of Homeland Security in creation of a Trade Fraud Task Force, with a focus on goods originating from China. The unit brings together prosecutors from DOJ, and investigators from CBP, “to bring robust enforcement against importers and other parties who seek to defraud the United States.”
“What I see this means,” comments Faulk, “is that the U.S. is prioritizing criminal prosecution for tariff evasion and Customs fraud as opposed to civil penalties. It aligns these duty issues with other cases.”
Title 18 of the U.S. Code targets anyone facilitating the entry of goods through the making of false statements, subjecting miscreants to criminal prosecution. DOJ could also cite the False Claims Act of 1863 as authority for prosecution of Customs fraud. Use of the latter for punishing underpayment of duties “is not entirely novel,” says Faulk, “but it’s being used more, now that there’s more incentive to engage in Customs fraud.”
Importers who uncover a misstatement of duties within their own organizations can self-report the error to Customs, thereby avoiding additional punitive damages. (They become liable only for the actual amount of the underpayment.) Faulk recommends that they take a close look at their past classification efforts, keeping in mind the five-year statute of limitations on violations.
“It’s becoming less safe to assume that Customs is not going to notice,” she says, citing tighter oversight capabilities due to Customs modernization initiatives such as the agency’s Global Business Identifier Test, and the prospect of a digital product passport program, similar to that pioneered by European Union regulators. In addition, CBP’s Trusted Trader Program offers expedited clearance if importers agree to provide transparency into their supply chain compliance efforts, making it tougher to conceal duty misclassifications or underpayments.
All of those efforts to clamp down on Customs fraud are incentivizing importers to think of compliance “not just as something that happens one time at the border, but as an integrated process across the supply chain, where products are increasingly visible to authorities,” Faulk says.
Faulk also encourages importers to take advantage of government programs such as duty drawback and foreign trade zones, as well as engage in legal tariff engineering and close review of existing supplier contracts, to mitigate the impact of Trump’s tariffs and widescale crackdown on Customs fraud. What they shouldn’t do, she adds, is hope for a significant reduction in those tariffs anytime soon.