By Steve Levine · Updated August 13, 2026 · 6 min read
Quick Answer
Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 lets the U.S. Trade Representative investigate a foreign country's trade practices and respond with tariffs when those practices are found unreasonable or discriminatory and burdensome to U.S. commerce. It is the authority behind the tariffs on Chinese goods imposed from 2018 onward, and behind the forced-labor duties of 10% and 12.5% that took effect on 60 economies at 12:01 a.m. Eastern on July 24, 2026 — the same day the temporary Section 122 surcharge expired. Section 301 was untouched by the Supreme Court's IEEPA ruling, so nothing collected under it is refundable.
On this page
- What Section 301 authorizes
- The investigation process
- The China tariffs
- The 2026 forced-labor action
- Why no refund follows
- Frequently asked questions
Section 301, codified at 19 U.S.C. sections 2411 through 2420, is aimed at conduct rather than products. The U.S. Trade Representative may act where a foreign country's acts, policies or practices violate a trade agreement, or are unreasonable or discriminatory and burden or restrict United States commerce. The available responses include imposing duties on that country's goods.
The organizing principle is the country, not the item. That distinguishes it from Section 232, which begins with a Commerce Department finding about a particular product category and applies regardless of origin.
An investigation is initiated either on petition or by USTR itself. The agency gathers evidence, generally seeks consultations with the government concerned, publishes proposed action, takes written comment and holds a hearing, and then issues a determination and a final action in the Federal Register. Duties take effect on a stated date and time, with in-transit exceptions for goods already loaded when the action lands.
That record-building sequence is why Section 301 actions are relatively durable in litigation. There is an agency determination, a comment process and a published rationale behind them.
The best-known use of the statute is the set of tariffs on Chinese-origin goods imposed from 2018, rolled out across successive product lists and periodically reviewed and adjusted since. Those duties have continued in force through the entire IEEPA episode. An importer of Chinese goods in 2025 could be paying IEEPA duties and Section 301 duties on the same entry — a fact that becomes important once only one of the two turns out to be refundable.
On March 12, 2026, USTR initiated 60 investigations examining whether economies had failed to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on importing goods produced with forced labor. In June 2026 it determined that each of the 60 had failed to do so in a way that is unreasonable or discriminatory and burdens U.S. commerce, and it proposed duties. According to those determinations, 54 of the economies had neither imposed nor effectively enforced such a prohibition, while six — Canada, Ecuador, the European Union, Indonesia, Mexico and Pakistan — maintained prohibitions but were found not to have enforced them effectively.
Written comments were due July 6, 2026 and a hearing followed on July 7. The final action took effect at 12:01 a.m. Eastern on July 24, 2026, applying additional duties of 10% to economies that maintain a forced-labor import prohibition or have committed to one through a reciprocal trade agreement, and 12.5% to the rest. The action carries annexed product exclusions and a mechanism allowing a volume of apparel and textile imports from certain economies to enter at a reduced rate. Goods already loaded on their final mode of transit before July 24 escaped the duty if entered before July 28. The implementing notice was published in the Federal Register on July 28, 2026.
The timing is the part worth noticing. The Section 122 surcharge hit its statutory 150-day expiration on July 24, and these duties began the same morning. For an importer the cost was close to continuous; the legal authority beneath it changed entirely.
Section 301 duties are collected under a statute that expressly authorizes them, pursuant to determinations no court has invalidated. They were never part of the roughly $166 billion IEEPA refund pool, and there is no Customs process for recovering them.
For the consumer tariff class actions, this sets a boundary that is easy to miss. Those complaints allege a company recovered the same tariff twice — once from customers, once from the government. A company paying Section 301 forced-labor duties today has no second recovery, so price increases attributable to those duties cannot support the theory. The refundable window is the IEEPA window, and a price that stayed high after February 2026 may simply reflect duties the company genuinely still owes.
Are Section 301 tariffs refundable?
No. The Supreme Court's February 2026 ruling concerned IEEPA and left Section 301 untouched. Duties collected under Section 301 — on Chinese goods and, since July 24, 2026, on 60 economies under the forced-labor determinations — remain in force, and there is no Customs refund process for them.
What are the July 2026 forced-labor tariffs?
The U.S. Trade Representative opened investigations on March 12, 2026 into 60 economies over their failure to impose or effectively enforce a prohibition on importing goods produced with forced labor, made determinations in June 2026, took comment and held a hearing in early July, and imposed additional duties effective 12:01 a.m. Eastern on July 24, 2026. The rate is 10 percent for economies that maintain such a prohibition or have committed to one and 12.5 percent for the rest, with product exclusions and a reduced-rate mechanism for certain apparel and textiles.
Why did the forced-labor tariffs start the same day the Section 122 surcharge ended?
The Section 122 surcharge carried a statutory 150-day limit that ran out on July 24, 2026, and the Section 301 forced-labor duties took effect at 12:01 a.m. Eastern that same day. The timing meant importers saw little practical gap in the duties they owed, even though the legal authority underneath those duties changed completely — and with it, whether any refund could ever follow.
How is Section 301 different from Section 232?
Both survived the 2026 ruling, but they target different things and run through different agencies. Section 232 rests on a Commerce Department finding that imports of a product threaten to impair national security, so it is organized around the product — steel, aluminum, automobiles. Section 301 rests on a U.S. Trade Representative finding about a foreign country's acts, policies or practices, so it is organized around the country or economy.
