The Liberty Justice Center is challenging the administration’s attempt to impose sweeping Section 301 tariffs on behalf of Burlap & Barrel, an American small business that builds direct, long-term relationships with smallholder farmers and producer cooperatives to bring distinctive, single-origin spices to American consumers; and Collective Horology, a California retailer and distributor that supports independent watchmakers around the globe by introducing their watches to consumers throughout the United States.
About Burlap and Barrel, Inc. v. Greer et al.
On July 24, 2026, the Liberty Justice Center filed a lawsuit in the U.S. Court of International Trade challenging the administration’s latest Section 301 tariffs.
The lawsuit argues that the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) failed to satisfy the requirements Congress established before imposing sweeping new taxes on American importers. It asks the court to declare the tariffs unlawful, prevent their enforcement, and preserve complete relief for Burlap & Barrel and Collective Horology, and the proposed class for affected entries, including refunds of tariffs already paid, with interest.
Section 301 authorizes USTR to investigate whether a particular foreign government’s act, policy or practice is unreasonable or discriminatory and burdens or restricts U.S. commerce. When the statutory requirements are met, USTR may take responsive action, including imposing tariffs, that are “appropriate and feasible” to obtain the elimination of the identified foreign practice.
But Congress did not give USTR universal power to impose a predetermined global tariff policy. Section 301 is not a blank check. Before taxing American businesses, USTR must establish the chain Congress required: identify a particular foreign practice, demonstrate how that practice burdens or restricts U.S. commerce and explain why the selected tariff is an appropriate and feasible means of eliminating it.
In this case USTR initiated 60 nominally separate investigations into whether foreign governments had failed to prohibit or effectively enforce bans on imports made with forced labor. Less than five months after initiating those investigations, USTR completed the proceedings and imposed a nearly universal tariff regime. Its final action imposes new duties of generally 10 or 12.5 percent on products from 60 economies that collectively account for roughly 99.4% of U.S. imports.
The case does not dispute that forced labor is wrong or that governments should combat it. It challenges USTR’s attempt to use that important objective to justify tariffs of extraordinary breadth without adequately establishing the findings Congress required.
USTR failed to sufficiently explain how the particular act, policy or practice of each covered economy burdens or restricts U.S. commerce. Nor did it explain why nearly uniform tariffs on substantially all products—including lawful goods with no identified connection to forced labor—would cause foreign governments to change their import-enforcement policies. USTR also failed to meaningfully consider more targeted alternatives aimed at particular goods, industries, companies or supply chains associated with forced labor.
The complaint further alleges that USTR acted arbitrarily and capriciously by applying near-uniform tariffs across 60 economies with materially different laws, enforcement records, and trade relationships without a reasoned, record-based explanation for treating them alike.
The human consequences of that unlawful shortcut are immediate.
Burlap & Barrel is a mission-driven spice company working to reduce inequality and exploitation in global food systems. By purchasing directly from smallholder farmers and eliminating unnecessary middlemen, the company can pay its farming partners two to ten times more than they would typically receive through conventional commodity markets.
These are not anonymous or interchangeable supply chains. Burlap & Barrel has spent years building long-term relationships with farmers and producer cooperatives around the world. Those partnerships allow the company to bring distinctive products—including garlic powder from Vietnam and Guatemala, chilies from Turkey, sea salt from Tanzania and Herbes de Provence from France—to American kitchens while helping small producers retain more of the value they create. These particular varieties cannot simply be replaced with domestically grown alternatives.
Instead of targeting exploitation, these tariffs punish an American business whose entire model is built around transparent supply chains, equitable relationships and better compensation for small farmers.
Collective Horology likewise supports independent watchmakers by introducing and distributing their watches—including those made by American, Swiss and other European craftspeople—to consumers throughout the United States. The tariffs increase the cost of the imported watches it sells and impair its ability to support the independent manufacturers and craftspeople on which its business depends.
There is also substantial evidence that this outcome was predetermined. Senior administration officials said that new tariff policies would keep tariff revenue “virtually unchanged” after the Supreme Court invalidated the administration’s tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and before the temporary Section 122 tariffs expired. Some of those statements were made before USTR completed—or, in some cases, even began—the investigations supposedly supporting this new tariff regime.
The final USTR notice repeatedly states that the rates, scope and exemptions were selected “in accordance with the specific direction of the President.” The challenged tariffs largely preserve the structure and revenue of the administration’s invalidated IEEPA tariffs and expiring Section 122 tariffs.
Congress assigned USTR the responsibility to make the statutory findings and exercise the independent judgment required by Section 301. Presidential demands for a particular tariff rate, scope or revenue target cannot substitute for that judgment.
The constitutional stakes extend far beyond Burlap & Barrel and Collective Horology. The power to impose tariffs is part of Congress’s Article I authority to tax and regulate foreign commerce. Congress may authorize the executive branch to act, but the executive must remain within the boundaries Congress established. If Section 301 could be interpreted to permit tariffs of virtually any scope on nearly any product from nearly any country, based on standards that impose no enforceable limit, it would transfer one of Congress’s core constitutional powers to the executive branch without a meaningful limiting principle.
“For the third time, the executive branch has taken a limited tariff authority and attempted to stretch it into a worldwide taxing power,” said Jeffrey Schwab, Senior Counsel and Director of Litigation at the Liberty Justice Center. “Changing the statute does not change the law. The Constitution gives the power to impose tariffs to Congress, and when Congress authorizes the executive branch to act, the administration must obey the limits Congress imposed. We will continue fighting for American businesses and consumers—and for the separation of powers—each time the government attempts to evade those limits.”
Jeffrey M. Schwab serves as Senior Counsel and Director of Litigation at the Liberty Justice Center, where he litigates cases to protect the rights to free speech, economic liberty, private property and other Constitutional rights in both federal and state courts across the country.
Reilly Stephens is a Senior Counsel at Liberty Justice Center, where he assists in cases to protect the rights to free speech, economic liberty, private property, and other Constitutional rights in courts across the country.
Since 2018, Collective Horology has worked to introduce American collectors to independent watchmakers whose work is rarely found in traditional stores.
The Ventura, California-based small business represents approximately 20 independent brands, including individual artisans and small workshops in Switzerland, the United Kingdom, France, Austria, Denmark, the Netherlands and the United States. Many produce only a limited number of watches each year, preserving specialized skills and traditions that have been developed over generations.
But now, new tariffs threaten Collective’s ability to bring their work to American consumers.
When a watch enters the United States, Collective—not the foreign government or foreign watchmaker—must pay the tariff. For a small American retailer importing highly specialized products, an additional tax of 10 or 12.5 percent can have an immediate and substantial impact.
Collective Horology began with two longtime watch enthusiasts, Asher Rapkin and Gabe Reilly.
They initially created Collective as a community of collectors who could work directly with respected manufacturers to develop distinctive collaborative watches. Since its founding, Collective has produced special editions with manufacturers including IWC Schaffhausen, Czapek, URWERK, H. Moser & Cie., Zenith, Armin Strom, J.N. Shapiro, Fears, Oris and Montblanc Minerva.
What began as a collectors’ community grew into an American retail business dedicated to independent watchmaking.
Collective seeks out watchmakers with a distinctive point of view and limited exposure in the United States. It then helps them reach American consumers through online retail, original articles and videos, podcasts, personal customer service and in-person events.
The company describes its approach simply: “Retailers carry inventory. We carry conviction.”
Rather than stocking watches solely because they are already popular, Collective introduces American collectors to artisans and independent manufacturers whose work it believes deserves a wider audience.
The watches Collective imports are not interchangeable mass-produced products. Each reflects the design, technical knowledge and craftsmanship of a particular maker. 
Many are produced in small workshops by watchmakers who cannot simply relocate their operations or recreate their work in the United States to avoid tariffs. Their expertise, specialized equipment, suppliers and traditions are often inseparable from the places where the watches are made.
Collective’s business depends on its ability to bring those watches into the United States and make them accessible to American consumers.
The new tariffs create serious challenges for Collective’s business:
These pressures fall especially heavily on a small retailer. Collective does not have the scale, capital reserves, or negotiating leverage of a multinational luxury conglomerate.
Tariffs therefore threaten more than individual sales. They make it harder for independent craftspeople to reach the American market and harder for an American small business to introduce their work to consumers.
Collective’s partnerships are not conventional wholesale arrangements. The company works closely with founders, designers and craftspeople, often helping relatively unknown brands develop an audience in the United States.
Independent makers trust Collective to represent their work thoughtfully and connect them with collectors who understand what makes their watches distinctive. American customers, in turn, rely on Collective to identify exceptional makers and provide the service and accountability of a domestic retailer.
Those direct relationships between makers and collectors are at the heart of Collective’s business.
What began as a project between two friends has grown into a small American company serving collectors across the country while giving independent craftspeople a foothold in the American market.
Collective Horology joined the Liberty Justice Center’s lawsuit because Section 301 is not a blank check to impose a predetermined global tariff program.
Congress required the government to identify particular foreign acts, policies or practices; determine how they burden American commerce; and select an appropriate response designed to address that conduct. The lawsuit argues that the government failed to satisfy those requirements before imposing sweeping tariffs on products from dozens of economies.
Collective is not responsible for the policies of the countries where independent watchmakers live and work. Yet it is Collective—and ultimately its American customers—that must bear the cost of the tariffs.
By joining this lawsuit, Collective hopes to protect its ability—and the ability of other American small businesses—to continue connecting skilled craftspeople around the world with American consumers.
Collective began with two friends who loved watches and wanted to share that enthusiasm with others. Today, it is fighting to preserve a business built around craftsmanship, trust and relationships that cross national borders.