Trade court orders CBP chief Rodney Scott to appear over compliance with $166B tariff-refund order

On May 27, 2026, Judge Richard Eaton of the U.S. Court of International Trade issued an order directing Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Rodney S. Scott to appear in person at a June 9 hearing in New York "to answer the court's questions as to the anticipated timing of Customs' compliance with the court's order." The directive stems from a March 4, 2026 ruling by Judge Eaton requiring CBP to refund roughly $166 billion in tariffs collected under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), levies the Supreme Court had declared illegal earlier this year. Because the original order applied to all importers rather than only the named parties, the refund obligation extends nationwide, covering an estimated 330,000 importers.

The government has acknowledged the scale of the problem without resolving it. In an April court filing, it conceded that it can process refunds for only about $127 billion of the $166 billion collected and has presented no proposal for refunding millions of additional entries. CBP has pointed to the operational difficulty of reviewing more than 70 million entries, and the court has previously granted extensions. Ordering the commissioner to testify in person — rather than continuing to accept status filings from counsel — marks a clear escalation and a signal that the court does not yet believe the agency has acted in good faith.

The Court of International Trade rarely compels an agency head to appear personally, and doing so over compliance with an existing refund order underscores judicial concern about defiance-by-delay of a specific directive. The narrower abuse here is non-compliance with a binding court order, compounded by the agency's failure to meet the statutory refund obligation that followed the Supreme Court's ruling. Should the June 9 hearing produce a finding of bad-faith noncompliance, the matter would sharpen from delay into open defiance.