The New Civil Liberties Alliance filed a lawsuit on behalf of paper importer Emily Ley Paper, doing business as Simplified, on April 3 challenging President Donald Trump's use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose 20% tariffs on all goods from China. Filing suit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida, Simplified laid out three constitutional and statutory claims against the use of IEEPA to impose tariffs and one claim that the tariffs violate the Administrative Procedure Act for unlawfully modifying the Harmonized Tariff Schedule (Emily Ley Paper, doing business as Simplified v. Donald J. Trump, N.D. Fla. # 3:25-00464).

With the White House announcing this week the end of the de minimis exemption for goods made in China starting next month, the U.S. will need to have the customs and trade infrastructure in place to handle significantly higher volumes of formal and informal entries, said Bernie Hart, vice president of customs for logistics provider Flexport.

The White House released a pre-publication copy of President Donald Trump’s executive order on reciprocal tariffs, with Annex III to the order detailing Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheadings that will be used for the tariffs that take effect at 12:01 a.m. on April 5 and on April 9.

President Donald Trump, on his flight to Florida on April 3, told reporters on the plane that "we put ourselves in the driver's seat" with the global tariff announcements, and now, "every country is calling us."

Multiple countries this week objected to President Donald Trump’s April 2 announcement of new reciprocal tariffs against trading partners (see 2504020072), saying they either plan to retaliate or are assessing how to respond.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., introduced a bill that would have future sections 232, 301 and 338 or International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) tariffs expire after 60 days unless Congress were to approve the tariffs imposed by the president.

President Donald Trump's use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to enact his sweeping "retaliatory" tariffs (see 2504020086) has drawn serious speculation about whether the statute can serve as a proper basis for invoking the tariffs. Trade lawyers told us that potential issues arising from the use of IEEPA include the existence of tariff-making authority to address trade deficits under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, the "major questions" doctrine and the way in which the tariffs were calculated.

A former Trump trade negotiator, Kelly Ann Shaw, described as "one of the key architects of the Administration’s trade, investment, energy and national security policies" in Trump's first term by her current law firm, said the reciprocal tariffs announced April 2, based on goods trade deficits, are not the same tariffs that will be in place weeks, months or years from now.

A day after President Donald Trump announced sweeping tariffs upon dozens of trading partners, including countries that the U.S. has historically had friendly relations with, customs brokers and importers have numerous questions, such as whether ACE has the ability to verify values accurately and what role drawback might have as companies respond to the tariffs.

A resolution that would eliminate the fentanyl smuggling and migration emergency for Canada, and thereby end 25% and 10% tariffs on Canadian goods, passed the Senate April 2, 51-48.