US food importer sues Trump over 50 percent tariffs on Canadian goods

The lawsuit argues Trump bypassed Congress and misused a century-old law to impose sweeping tariffs on Canadian imports.

A person shops for cheese at Atwater Market in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, on March 9, 2025 [File: Graham Hughes/Reuters]

A US food importer is suing US President Donald Trump over his 50 percent tariffs on Canadian goods, arguing he lacks the legal authority to impose sweeping tariffs without congressional approval.

Gellert Global Group, a New Jersey-based company that imports Canadian cheese, filed the lawsuit on Tuesday in the US Court of International Trade in New York.

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The company says the tariffs are driving up its costs and disrupting its relationships with suppliers on both sides of the border. Between September 16 and October 11, Gellert had paid more than $520,000 in duties, according to the complaint .

“Gellert Global Group has spent generations building trusted relationships with suppliers, customers and partners across the food industry,” said Thomas Gellert, the company’s co-chief executive officer, in a press release . “These tariffs disrupt those relationships overnight and create costs and uncertainty that ripple through the entire supply chain.”

The lawsuit challenges Trump’s decision to use a Depression-era law to impose tariffs on a wide range of Canadian products, including dairy products, furniture, clothing and wine.

Trump first imposed the 50 percent tariffs over the summer , accusing Canada of discriminating against American-made cars, alcohol and dairy products. He expanded the measures in September, adding more products in response to Canadian retaliatory tariffs .

The lawsuit argues that the law doesn’t apply to the Canadian policies the Trump administration says are discriminatory, since two of them “arose in response to the president’s own tariffs, while the third involves Canadian dairy policy governed by the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA)”.

It also questions why Canadian cheese is being taxed over disputes involving alcohol and cars.

“No president should have the power to pull a dormant statute off the shelf and use it to impose sweeping tariffs or import bans without the limits Congress required,” said Sara Albrecht, chairman and CEO of the Liberty Justice Center, a nonprofit legal organisation that filed the suit on Gellert’s behalf.

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment, according to the Reuters news agency.

At the centre of the case is Section 338 of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, which allows the president to impose tariffs of up to 50 percent on imports from countries found to discriminate against American businesses.

The provision had never been used until Trump invoked it this year.

The lawsuit argues that newer laws passed by Congress since then, such as Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, require investigations, public comment and other safeguards that Gellert says the Trump administration has bypassed, and that these override Section 338.

“The administration cannot skip those protections by reaching for a 1930 statute that no president had ever used to impose a tariff,” said Jeffrey Schwab, the Liberty Justice Center’s senior counsel and director of litigation.

In addition, the lawsuit says that even if Trump is allowed to use the older law, he hasn’t met its requirements, including waiting 30 days before tariffs can be collected on new products added to the list.

The administration only waited seven days to start collecting tariffs on cheese in September, according to the lawsuit.

Gellert is asking the court to declare the tariffs illegal, stop them from being collected, and order refunds with interest for importers who have been impacted.

The lawsuit marks the fourth major legal challenge to Trump’s tariffs.

In February, the US Supreme Court struck down most of the tariffs he imposed in 2025, and a trade court later ruled against a temporary 10 percent global tariff. A separate challenge to tariffs imposed over alleged forced labour in international trade is still pending.

诉讼称，特朗普绕过国会，滥用一项百年历史的法律，对加拿大进口商品征收全面关税。

2025年3月9日，一名顾客在加拿大魁北克省蒙特利尔的阿特沃特市场购买奶酪。[图片：Graham Hughes/路透社]

一家美国食品进口商起诉美国总统唐纳德·特朗普，指控他对加拿大商品征收 50% 的关税，认为他没有法律授权在未经国会批准的情况下征收如此大范围的关税。

总部位于新泽西州的 Gellert Global Group 公司进口加拿大奶酪，该公司于周二在纽约的美国国际贸易法院提起诉讼。

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该公司表示，关税推高了其成本，并扰乱了其与边境两侧供应商的关系。根据诉状，9月16日至10月11日期间，Gellert公司已支付超过52万美元的关税。

“盖勒特全球集团多年来一直致力于与食品行业的供应商、客户和合作伙伴建立互信关系，”公司联席首席执行官托马斯·盖勒特在一份新闻稿中表示。“这些关税一夜之间破坏了这些关系，并造成了成本和不确定性，这些影响波及整个供应链。”

该诉讼挑战特朗普利用大萧条时期的法律对包括乳制品、家具、服装和葡萄酒在内的各种加拿大产品征收关税的决定。

今年夏天，特朗普首次对加拿大加征50%的关税，指责加拿大歧视美国制造的汽车、酒类和乳制品。9月份，为回应加拿大采取的报复性关税措施，他将更多产品列入加征关税名单。

诉讼认为，该法律不适用于特朗普政府所称的具有歧视性的加拿大政策，因为其中两项政策“是为了应对总统自己的关税而制定的，而第三项政策涉及受《美国-墨西哥-加拿大协定》（USMCA）管辖的加拿大乳制品政策”。

它还质疑，为什么加拿大奶酪会因为涉及酒精和汽车的纠纷而被征税。

“任何总统都不应该有权将一项尘封已久的法律从书架上取下来，并用它来实施大范围的关税或进口禁令，而不受国会要求的限制，”代表盖勒特提起诉讼的非营利法律组织“自由正义中心”的主席兼首席执行官萨拉·阿尔布雷希特说。

据路透社报道，白宫尚未对此事作出回应。

本案的核心是 1930 年《斯穆特-霍利关税法》第 338 条，该条款允许总统对被认定歧视美国企业的国家的进口商品征收高达 50% 的关税。

该条款此前从未被使用过，直到今年特朗普援引了它。

诉讼称，国会此后通过的新法律，如 1974 年贸易法第 301 条，要求进行调查、公众评议和其他保障措施，而盖勒特表示，特朗普政府已经绕过了这些措施，并且这些措施凌驾于第 338 条之上。

“政府不能援引 1930 年的法令来绕过这些保护措施，因为没有任何一位总统曾利用该法令征收关税，”自由正义中心高级律师兼诉讼主任杰弗里·施瓦布说。

此外，诉讼称，即使允许特朗普使用旧法律，他也没有满足该法律的要求，包括对添加到清单中的新产品征收关税前必须等待 30 天。

诉讼称，政府仅用了七天时间就在九月份开始对奶酪征收关税。

盖勒特请求法院宣布这些关税非法，停止征收这些关税，并责令受影响的进口商获得带息退款。

这场诉讼标志着特朗普关税政策面临的第四次重大法律挑战。

今年2月，美国最高法院驳回了特朗普政府计划在2025年实施的大部分关税，随后一家贸易法庭也裁定一项临时性的10%全球关税无效。另一项针对所谓国际贸易中强迫劳动问题而征收的关税挑战仍在审理中。