Consumers Sue Amazon, Alleging Unpaid Trump Tariff Reimbursements

Amazon.com Inc. was sued Friday by consumers seeking reimbursement for costs passed on to them in the form of higher prices as a result of tariffs that the U.S. Supreme Court later concluded were illegally imposed by President Donald Trump.

Consumers in a proposed class action lawsuit filed in federal court in Seattle claim the e-commerce giant collected hundreds of millions of dollars in illegal tariff costs by raising prices on imported goods before the Supreme Court ruled.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a 6-3 decision in February that Trump overstepped his authority by using the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to impose sweeping tariffs.

Following the decision, thousands of companies began demanding billions of dollars in refunds from the government.

But Amazon didn’t do this; This was “not because he lacked a legal basis, but because he was trying to curry favor with Trump by allowing the federal government to keep the funds,” the lawsuit alleged.

“The problem is that the funds Amazon uses to stay in the President’s good graces do not belong to Amazon,” the lawsuit states. “These funds were wrongfully taken from consumers to cover IEEPA Tariffs that have since been invalidated.”

The lawsuit alleges unjust enrichment and violations of Washington state’s consumer protection law.

Amazon did not respond to a request for comment.

The lawsuit follows several earlier lawsuits filed by consumers who accused companies ranging from Costco to Nike to FedEx of failing to pass on tariff rebates to consumers.

Friday’s lawsuit states that unlike companies that import goods, consumers do not have the right to seek tariff refunds from the government due to the high costs they incur while the tariffs are in effect.

To support its claim that politics were behind Amazon’s actions, the lawsuit notes that the company faced blowback at the White House following a report in April 2025 that it was considering showing how much of a product’s cost came from IEEPA tariffs.

Amazon denied the story and said it never intended to list tariff prices on its main retail site. However, the lawsuit states that the report led Trump to call Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos to complain.