A New Jersey cheese importer is asking a federal trade court to block President Trump’s 50% Canadian tariffs, testing a rarely used 1930 law the White House says Congress gave him to fight foreign discrimination.
The New York Post reported that the Liberty Justice Center filed suit Tuesday in the U.S. Court of International Trade on behalf of Gellert Global Group, a New Jersey importer. The company wants a preliminary injunction to stop the 50% duties on Canadian products.
The complaint argues President Trump went beyond his authority by imposing the tariffs without fresh authorization from Congress. It takes direct aim at Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930, the statute the White House cited for the latest round of duties.
The fight lands in the same legal arena where the administration already lost a major tariff case earlier this year. Importers are pressing the courts again while the White House says it is defending American workers, farmers, and firms against what it calls Canadian discrimination.
In August, President Trump subjected a range of Canadian goods to 50% tariffs amid a heated trade dispute. The list reached beyond metals already under pressure. It covered alcohol, hockey sticks, and cement, on top of existing levies on aluminum, lumber, vehicles, and steel.
The 50% duties took effect Sept. 9. The same period brought a ban on Canadian alcohol, including whiskey, malt beer, sparkling wine, vermouth, cider, and other spirits.
Those steps followed a claim that Canada had discriminated against U.S. businesses. Duties were briefly paused while Canada and the White House tried to negotiate. Instead of a deal, both sides escalated. Canada imposed reciprocal tariffs on U.S. goods, and the talks collapsed.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney blamed “last-minute changes in the US proposed terms,” calling them “unfair, uneconomic” and saying they called “into question the reliability of any deal.”
The administration is not backing off. In a statement, the White House said Congress already gave the president the tool he used.
"Congress empowered the President under Section 338 to offset the burden or disadvantage from discrimination by foreign governments against U.S. commerce in favor of other foreign commerce, including Canada’s continued discrimination against American dairy, alcohol, and auto exports,"
The same statement made clear the legal fight will not change the policy goal.
"Today’s complaint will not deter President Trump’s commitment to level the playing field for American workers, farmers, and firms, and the Administration will defend vigorously the President’s actions in court."
That framing puts American dairy producers, alcohol makers, and auto exporters at the center of the dispute. The White House says the tariffs answer foreign rules that tilt trade away from U.S. commerce. The importer suing wants those duties blocked before they reshape its Canadian supply lines.
Gellert Global Group is a $1.7 billion company. It imported $71 million worth of Canadian cheese last year, including goat’s milk cheese, brie, mascarpone, and camembert. Co-chief executive Thomas Gellert estimates the new tariffs will cost the firm $40 million a year on cheese imports alone.
The company’s supply chain crosses the border twice in some cases. Suppliers buy milk from dairy farmers in upstate New York, process it into brie in Canada, then ship the finished cheese back to the United States. Gellert also pays taxes and tariffs on imports into the U.S. and on dairy shipped into Canada.
Gellert described the business relationships the duties now threaten.
"Gellert Global Group has spent generations building trusted relationships with suppliers, customers and partners across the food industry,"
He added that the sudden cost spike does not stay inside one firm’s books.
"These tariffs disrupt those relationships overnight and create costs and uncertainty that ripple through the entire supply chain."
Those are real commercial pressures for an importer built on cross-border specialty cheese. They are also the predictable result of a tariff fight aimed at what the White House calls long-running Canadian barriers against American dairy and other exports. Importers feel the duty first. The policy target is the foreign discrimination the administration says Congress authorized the president to offset.
Liberty Justice Center chairman and chief executive Sara Albrecht called Section 338 “a dormant statute,” saying it had not been used before now. The new complaint treats that revival as overreach and asks the trade court for a preliminary injunction.
Section 338 sits in the Tariff Act of 1930. The White House reads it as a standing grant of power to counter foreign discrimination against U.S. commerce. The plaintiffs read the same text as a limit the president crossed without new approval from Congress. That clash is now in front of the U.S. Court of International Trade.
Trade statutes from that era still shape modern customs fights. When presidents use them after years of quiet, the first courtroom test often decides whether the tool stays available for the next dispute. This filing is that test for Section 338.
This is not the Liberty Justice Center’s first run at Trump tariff policy. In February, the group won a major case when the Supreme Court struck down tariffs the president had imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, a different law often shortened to IEEPA. That statute is the emergency-powers law presidents have used for sanctions and related economic measures.
The government has been refunding those earlier tariff payments, including interest. The new case switches statutes. It leaves emergency powers behind and leans on Section 338 instead, keeping the core fight over how far the president can go on duties without a fresh vote in Congress.
Court setbacks on trade have already drawn hard public reaction from the president, including comments on how Supreme Court tariff rulings have carried national costs. The legal pressure did not end with the IEEPA loss.
Separate coverage of the current term has flagged a docket already loaded with high-stakes fights, from climate cases to gun rules and Trump policy cases headed toward the justices. Tariff authority remains one of the live wires.
After repeated losses, Trump has also voiced frustration with his own nominees, including public regret over Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett following adverse rulings. The pattern matters here because the Liberty Justice Center is back in court with a new statute and a new injunction request.
Another account of that same tension tracked repeated court setbacks and the president’s response to them. The Canadian duties case now asks a specialized trade court to decide whether Section 338 can carry the policy the Supreme Court rejected under IEEPA.
A preliminary injunction would freeze the 50% Canadian tariffs while the case proceeds. Without one, Gellert says it faces a $40 million yearly hit on cheese alone, with wider strain on suppliers and customers. With one, the White House loses a lever it says was built to answer Canadian discrimination against American dairy, alcohol, and auto exports.
The parties are clear. Liberty Justice Center represents the importer. The Trump administration is the defendant. The venue is the U.S. Court of International Trade. The statute under fire is Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930. The practical objects in the crossfire are Canadian cheese shipments, banned spirits, and a long list of industrial goods already wrapped into the broader dispute.
No docket number was released in the initial account of the filing. The absolute calendar date was given only as Tuesday. What is not in doubt is the remedy sought: stop the 50% duties now, on the claim that Congress never green-lit this use of a nearly century-old tariff law.
American farmers and manufacturers were supposed to get relief from foreign barriers. A large importer of Canadian specialty cheese wants the courts to take that relief off the table. The White House says it will defend the president’s hand in court. Taxpayers already watching refunds from the last tariff loss now get a second test of how far trade enforcement can go before judges pull it back.