Clean Clothes Campaign questions who benefits from the billions in tariff refunds

The Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC) is calling on apparel brands to publicly disclose what they have received in US tariff refunds and urging them to give a fair share to the suppliers and workers who absorbed the cost.

The organisation, a global network of trade unions and NGOs working to improve conditions in the garment industry, notes that the companies are recovering duties they paid to US Customs, after the US Supreme Court ruled the tariffs unlawful in February.

The Court of International Trade has ordered refunds to importers of record, the companies that paid the duty at the border. Since May this year, the US Treasury has disbursed 100 billion USD out of the 166 billion USD collected under IEEPA. Up to 330,000 importers are eligible for a refund, but suppliers and garment workers, who never paid the duty directly, are not among them.

The CCC states that companies including Target (800 million USD), Amazon (600 million USD), Nike (300 million USD) and Columbia Sportswear (78 million USD) have all received refunds, and is now calling on them to disclose whether and how the money will be used to compensate the suppliers and upstream workers who "had to absorb the added cost levied on the importers."

Research from the Business & Human Rights Centre, which the CCC references, found that suppliers in sourcing countries including Bangladesh, Cambodia, India and Sri Lanka saw orders paused or cancelled, felt pressure to reduce prices and, in some cases, were asked to take on or share additional tariff-related costs following the 2025 US tariff announcement.

Differences in tariff rates between countries also saw many companies rapidly reallocating their sourcing, moving orders from high-tariff countries to lower-tariff countries, putting even more pressure on the already narrow supplier margins.

The consequences of the US tariffs landed on workers. The Centre reported factory closures, layoffs, reduced working hours, wage cuts and delayed payments across garment-producing countries, with women and migrant workers particularly exposed through precarious employment and limited social protections. In July, the Centre reported that more than 20,000 garment workers had lost their jobs through downsizing or factory layoffs in the first half of 2026.

The impact is also visible in export data. Bangladesh's US apparel exports fell 8.53 percent in January and February 2026, from around 1.5 billion USD to 1.37 billion, divided between a 6.21 percent drop in volume and a 2.47 percent drop in unit prices, according to a report from the Bangladesh Apparel Exchange based on OTEXA data.

None of that loss is visible in the refund system, which recognises only those who paid the duty at the US border, leaving the suppliers and workers who absorbed the cost dependent on brands choosing to share it.