Food importer sues Trump over 50% Canadian tariffs, citing legal overreach

Gellert Global Group, a New Jersey food importer, walked into federal court this week with a straightforward complaint: the president had no legal right to do what he did. The company filed suit in the US Court of International Trade in New York on Tuesday, challenging Donald Trump's 50 percent tariffs on Canadian goods—a move the lawsuit argues amounts to executive overreach dressed up in Depression-era law.

The tariffs have cost Gellert real money in real time. Between mid-September and mid-October, the company paid more than $520,000 in duties on its Canadian cheese imports alone. But the lawsuit frames the damage more broadly: these tariffs, Gellert argues, have fractured relationships with suppliers built over generations and sent shockwaves through a supply chain that depends on seamless cross-border movement. Thomas Gellert, the company's co-chief executive, said the tariffs "disrupt those relationships overnight and create costs and uncertainty that ripple through the entire supply chain."

At the heart of the case sits Section 338 of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, a provision that allows a president to impose tariffs up to 50 percent on imports from countries deemed to discriminate against American business. No president had ever used it until Trump invoked it this year. The lawsuit argues this is precisely the problem. Gellert's legal team, represented by the Liberty Justice Center, contends that Trump bypassed more recent congressional safeguards—specifically Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974—which require investigations, public comment periods, and other protections before tariffs can take effect. "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.

The lawsuit also questions the logic of the tariffs themselves. Trump first imposed the 50 percent rate over the summer, citing what he called Canadian discrimination against American-made cars, alcohol, and dairy products. He expanded the measures in September, adding more products in response to Canadian retaliatory tariffs. Yet the lawsuit points out an apparent disconnect: Canadian cheese is being taxed over disputes involving alcohol and automobiles. Moreover, two of the Canadian policies Trump cited as discriminatory were themselves responses to his own tariffs, and the third involves dairy policy governed by the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement—a trade deal the US itself signed.

There is also a procedural violation at issue. The lawsuit alleges that even if Trump had the authority to use Section 338, he failed to meet its requirements. The law requires a 30-day waiting period before tariffs can be collected on newly added products. When cheese was added to the tariff list in September, the administration waited only seven days before collecting duties.

Gellert is asking the court to declare the tariffs illegal, halt their collection, and order refunds with interest for affected importers. The case arrives amid a pattern of legal setbacks for Trump's tariff agenda. In February, the US Supreme Court struck down most of the tariffs he imposed in 2025. 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 remains pending. This lawsuit marks the fourth major legal challenge to Trump's tariff regime, suggesting that the courts may become the arena where the scope of presidential trade authority gets redefined.