Ventura watch seller, other small businesses sue over Trump’s new sweeping tariffs

NEW YORK — Trump’s tariffs are headed to court — again.

Two lawsuits filed by small businesses, including a Ventura watch seller, are challenging Trump’s sweeping tariffs announced Thursday that impose double-digit levies on 60 trading partners.

The tariffs, implemented under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 for what the Trump administration alleges is the targeted countries’ failure to prevent imports produced by forced labor, cover 99% of U.S. imports.

Critics say the goal is less to prevent forced-labor imports and more to replace the worldwide tariffs that Trump imposed last year that were struck down by the Supreme Court in February. The new import taxes came just as temporary, 10% worldwide tariffs — which had also been challenged in court — expired.

Educational toy company Learning Resources, which was part of the tariff lawsuit that won in the Supreme Court, filed a new suit along with several other small businesses in the Court of International Trade on Friday over the current round of tariffs.

The second lawsuit was filed by Burlap and Barrel, a New York-based spice company, and Collective Horology, a watch retailer based in Ventura. They are represented by Liberty Justice Center, a libertarian advocacy group.

Both lawsuits argue that the government didn’t adequately establish its case against each specific economy or spell out how the tariffs will eliminate the specified practice they are being levied to address, as required by Section 301.

“Forced labor is morally indefensible, but an important objective does not give the government permission to ignore the law,” said Sara Albrecht, chairman and CEO of the Liberty Justice Center. “The administration allowed one global tariff to expire and immediately replaced it with another under a different statute. Changing the statute doesn’t change the law.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Experts say it might be tougher to successfully challenge the current round of tariffs than previous rounds. Trump used Section 301 to impose big tariffs on China in his first term, and they survived court challenges.

Unlike the Section 122 import taxes that expired Friday, “these tariffs will be with us for the long haul,’’ said lawyer Patrick Childress, a partner at Holland & Knight and a former U.S. trade official.

Even if countries enact the policies the U.S. wants, he said, they will still need to prove that they’re enforcing them to Washington’s satisfaction before the tariffs are removed. “This suggests that no short-term path for countrywide relief from the new Section 301 tariffs will be available.”

Anderson writes for the Associated Press.