Nike is the latest brand to come under fire from consumers seeking payback for the tariffs they say they paid in the form of higher prices at retail.
Like Shein, Temu, Costco and Lululemon before it, the athleticwear titan is being targeted by shoppers in a class action lawsuit alleging that it failed to pass along the tariff refunds it’s recouping from the federal government.
President Donald Trump’s International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) tariffs were ruled unlawful by the Supreme Court on Feb. 20, and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) launched the Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries (CAPE) portal, an IEEPA-tariff-specific online refund tool, on April 20. CBP indicated that the first refunds would hit importers’ accounts on May 12.
The proposed class action suit against Nike, filed in a Portland, Oregon federal court, claims that the brand stands to, in essence, benefit doubly from the duties. First, it raised prices on consumers—to the tune of $5 to $10 for footwear and $2 to $10 for apparel—to offset the costs of the tariffs. Now that it’s seeking to recoup the tariff payments from customs, the plaintiffs wrote, Nike aims to pocket the refunds.
“Nike has made no legally binding commitment to return tariff-related overcharges to the consumers who actually paid them,” the complaint said. “Unless restrained by this court, Nike stands to recover the same tariff payments twice—once from consumers through higher prices and again from the federal government through tariff refunds.”
Nike has previously claimed it paid $1 billion on goods imported under the IEEPA tariff regime.
The suit follows a similar format to those filed against other national and international brands and retailers selling to U.S. consumers.
Costco became the first American corporation to sue the administration for IEEPA tariff refunds in December, well before the Supreme Court ruling was handed down. After the high court’s decision, the warehouse club was a the subject of an Illinois lawsuit claiming that it would be receiving “double recovery” if it didn’t find a way to pass along the refunds to its members.
Lululemon in March faced an analogous suit from a group shoppers who said they were owed some portion of the “hundreds of millions” of dollars the athleticwear brand stands to recoup in refunds for the IEEPA tariffs.
