The Trump administration is moving fast to rebuild its tariff wall. Starting this week, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative will open hearings in two sweeping investigations that could impose new import taxes on dozens of countries, a direct response to the Supreme Court's February ruling that struck down tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.

The clock is ticking. Temporary replacement tariffs slapped on imports two days after the high court's decision expire July 24. If the administration cannot finalize new levies under a different legal authority before then, a significant piece of the president's trade agenda goes dark.

That different authority is Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, a statute that authorizes tariffs and other sanctions against countries found to engage in "unjustifiable," "unreasonable," or "discriminatory" trade practices. The administration is betting that Section 301, a law with a long track record and a built-in investigative process, will survive the kind of legal challenge that sank the IEEPA tariffs.

Two investigations, one goal

The hearings break into two tracks, AP News reported. On Tuesday and Wednesday, the trade representative's office will examine whether 60 economies do enough to prohibit the trade in products created by forced labor. Those 60 economies account for 99% of U.S. imports. The list stretches from Nigeria to Norway, and includes China, the European Union, and Japan.

Next week, a second round of hearings will probe whether 16 U.S. trading partners are overproducing goods, driving down prices and putting American manufacturers at a disadvantage. Erica York of the Tax Foundation noted those 16 economies account for 70% of U.S. imports. China, the EU, and Japan appear on both lists.

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer framed the forced-labor investigation in stark terms:

"For too long, American workers and firms have been forced to compete against foreign producers who may have an artificial cost advantage gained from the scourge of forced labor."

Greer said he would not prejudge the investigations. But Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has already proclaimed that the U.S. government will replace its original tariff revenues with new import taxes, including ones imposed under Section 301. And President Trump himself said the new tariffs "are going to get us more money."

The Supreme Court forced the pivot

On February 20, the Supreme Court ruled that Trump had overstepped his authority by invoking IEEPA to impose double-digit tariffs on almost every country on Earth. The decision held that IEEPA could not be used to impose tariffs, full stop. The federal government must now refund money to importers who paid those levies.

Before the ruling, the IEEPA tariffs had already brought in $166 billion in revenue. Lost revenue had been projected to reach $1.6 trillion over the next decade. That is a hole no administration can ignore.

The president sharply criticized the Supreme Court after the ruling. Two days later, the administration imposed 10% tariffs on imports under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974, which allows the president to levy global tariffs as high as 15% for up to 150 days. Trump said he would raise the rate to the maximum 15% but has not done so.

Those Section 122 tariffs are a stopgap. They expire July 24, and the administration needs something permanent, or at least longer-lasting, to take their place. Section 301 tariffs last four years and can be extended.

Speed versus process

Here is where the timeline gets interesting. When Trump used Section 301 tariffs against China during his first term, the investigation and public comment period took nearly a year. If the current investigations produce new tariffs in time to replace the expiring Section 122 levies, the entire process will have taken less than half that long.

Kenya Davis, a partner at Boies Schiller Flexner who has done pro bono work on human trafficking and forced labor, questioned whether the compressed schedule can produce credible results:

"It's such a short timeframe. It's so condensed that it doesn't make a lot of sense that they can do it that quickly."

That concern is worth taking seriously, not because the administration's trade goals are wrong, but because the legal durability of the new tariffs depends on the process behind them. Section 301 has survived court challenges before precisely because it requires investigation, hearings, and findings. Cutting corners on the process could hand opponents the same kind of legal opening that brought down the IEEPA tariffs.

The administration has also explored other avenues to revisit the Supreme Court's IEEPA ruling, but for now, Section 301 is the primary vehicle.

Can IEEPA's flexibility be replicated?

One of the reasons the IEEPA tariffs were so useful to the administration was their flexibility. Scott Lincicome of the Cato Institute's Center for Trade Policy Studies put it bluntly:

"One of the reasons Trump used IEEPA is because it was just a complete blank slate."

He described the old arrangement as "a little tariff switch in the Oval Office that Trump could flip on and off anytime he wants; he wakes up in the morning and he doesn't like a Canadian television commercial, he flips the switch... You really can't do that with 301."

That is exactly the kind of unilateral power the Supreme Court decided Congress never intended to grant under IEEPA. Section 301 trades speed and flexibility for legal process and institutional structure. For an administration that used the threat of instant tariffs to strong-arm trade agreements with the European Union, Japan, and South Korea, the loss of that leverage is real.

But the legal landscape is what it is. And Section 301 has its own advantages: a well-established statutory framework, a record of surviving judicial review, and the ability to target specific trade practices rather than blanketing every country on Earth with the same rate.

The political math

Congress could, in theory, extend the Section 122 tariffs past their July 24 expiration. But lawmakers have shown little appetite for that fight, particularly with November's midterm elections approaching. Voting to extend tariffs, which raise costs on imported goods, is not the kind of thing most members want on their record heading into a campaign.

That political reality makes the Section 301 investigations even more important. If the hearings produce findings that support new tariffs before the temporary levies expire, the administration can keep its trade policy intact without asking Congress for help. If the process drags past July 24, there could be a gap, and a gap means lost revenue and reduced leverage at the negotiating table.

The broader legal environment around executive authority remains in flux. Courts have been increasingly willing to check presidential power across a range of policy areas, and trade is no exception.

Lincicome was blunt about where he thinks the investigations are headed:

"If you believe the Treasury secretary and the president, then the cake is already baked. These investigations will result in tariffs that approximate what the Supreme Court overruled in February."

That may be true as a political prediction. But whether those tariffs survive legal challenge depends on whether the administration builds a record strong enough to justify them under Section 301's own terms.

Legal cover, or legal risk?

Joyce Adetutu, a trade lawyer and partner at Vinson & Elkins, suggested that courts may give the administration the benefit of the doubt even if the new tariffs look a lot like the old ones:

"Even if it is a veiled, or less-than-veiled, attempt to reinitiate the IEEPA tariffs, he still has the cover of the process itself."

That is the key bet the administration is making. Follow the process, build the record, hold the hearings, and the courts will defer. It is a more disciplined approach than IEEPA, which required no investigation, no hearings, and no findings.

The Supreme Court has shown it is willing to draw lines around executive trade authority, even when the policy goals enjoy broad public support. The current Court has weighed several major questions about the scope of presidential power, and the administration cannot afford to assume deference.

The forced-labor investigation, in particular, touches on an issue with genuine bipartisan support. Few members of Congress, and even fewer judges, want to be seen defending trade in goods produced by forced labor. If the administration builds a serious evidentiary record on that front, the resulting tariffs could be among the most legally durable tools in its trade arsenal.

What comes next

The hearings begin this week. The Section 122 tariffs expire July 24. And the administration has made clear it intends to have new levies in place before that deadline. Whether the process can move that fast, and whether the results will hold up in court, remains to be seen.

The stakes are not small. The original IEEPA tariffs were projected to generate $1.6 trillion over a decade. The Supreme Court's willingness to intervene in executive action has reshaped the legal terrain. And the administration's ability to protect American workers and manufacturers from unfair foreign competition now depends on whether it can do through careful legal process what it once did with the stroke of a pen.

The goal, shielding American industry from subsidized foreign overproduction and goods made by forced labor, is sound. The question is whether Washington can execute it with the discipline the courts now demand.