Trump task force uncovers more than $1 billion in trade fraud

(CNN) — The Trump administration says its trade fraud crackdown has already topped $1 billion in recoveries and alleged losses, less than a year after the launch of a task force dedicated to this initiative.

The figure includes money recovered through criminal and civil cases, including penalties, settlements, restitution, asset forfeitures and losses alleged in pending cases, according to the task force. Only $150 million of that total is tied to pending cases. The news was shared exclusively with CNN.

The Trump administration has made trade enforcement a central part of its broader effort to increase tariff collections and crack down on companies accused of circumventing US trade rules.

The task force, led by the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Security, was established just as President Donald Trump’s delayed “Liberation Day” tariffs took effect, with rates as high as 50% on goods from certain countries. The Supreme Court later ruled the president lacked sufficient authority to impose the tariffs.

The steep tariff rates gave importers a greater financial incentive to reduce their duty bills — sometimes through legal strategies, such as adjusting products to qualify for different tariff classifications or using customs-regulated warehouses that allow companies to delay payments.

But it may have also pushed more importers to turn to illegal schemes, too.

A Goldman Sachs analysis last year estimated tariff evasion could eventually affect more than $200 billion in US imports and reduce tariff revenue by roughly $40 billion over the long term. The economists identified misreporting the value of goods, falsifying countries of origin and routing shipments through third countries with lower tariffs as among the most likely methods of evasion.

There are hints of possible tariff evasion in discrepancies between the value of imports the United States has reported for countries and the value that other countries reported they exported to the US during a given time, the economists said.

The analysis also noted that the impact could be smaller if the administration’s efforts to curb evasion proved effective.

The case that pushed the task force over the $1 billion threshold was an American jewelry importer charged with falsely declaring the country of origin and rerouting imported gold pieces through a country with a lower tariff rate.

The charges filed in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois allege the jewelry, which had an estimated total value of more than approximately $240 million, was associated with $13.6 million in missing tariff revenue.

“The Department’s focus remains constant: if you misclassify goods or falsify origins to evade any lawful duty, regardless of when those duties were enacted or evolve over time, we will investigate and prosecute you,” Assistant Attorney General Colin McDonald, who heads the task force, said in a statement to CNN.

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