A Federal Circuit administrative stay leaves the Court of International Trade's IEEPA refund portal intact, with $35.5 billion in importer claims already queued.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has entered an administrative stay that preserves a parallel refund proceeding in the U.S. Court of International Trade, even as appellate litigation over the scope of presidential tariff authority continues [1]. The stay, entered May 13, 2026, halts a lower-court ruling on Section 122 tariff authority but leaves untouched the separate track through which importers are now filing claims for duties collected under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act [1]. The government has reported $35.5 billion in refunds and accrued interest already queued in that pipeline [1].
The underlying authority for the refund proceedings traces to a February 2026 Supreme Court decision declaring the IEEPA tariffs unlawful [2]. The Court of International Trade subsequently established a structured claims process, and U.S. Customs and Border Protection launched an online refund portal in late April 2026 to receive importer submissions [1][2]. The Federal Circuit's administrative stay, which freezes a discrete ruling on Section 122 authority pending further appellate review, does not disturb that portal or the CIT proceedings governing it [1].
The procedural split matters because importers face separate, time-sensitive filing obligations across two tracks. At the CIT, counsel must navigate protest filing deadlines and administrative exhaustion requirements to preserve refund rights on individual entries [2]. The administrative stay creates uncertainty about whether Section 122 authority, which governs a narrower category of emergency tariffs, might survive further appellate scrutiny, complicating strategy for importers whose entries may implicate both statutory bases [1][2]. Analysts have placed the total universe of potentially recoverable duties at approximately $166 billion, making the aggregate exposure one of the largest government reimbursement exercises in recent memory [2].
What comes next depends on the pace of Federal Circuit merits briefing on the stayed ruling. If the court affirms the CIT's invalidation of the remaining IEEPA tariff instruments, the refund portal process will likely expand in scope and volume. If the government prevails on any distinct Section 122 grounds, some importer claims may be partially offset or delayed [1][2]. Trade counsel have advised clients to file protective protests and monitor CBP portal guidance on a rolling basis, given that procedural defaults can extinguish otherwise valid refund claims [2].