President Donald Trump’s trade team has opened wide-ranging investigations into 16 major U.S. trading partners, creating the possibility of another round of tariffs after the Supreme Court overturned the administration’s earlier duties on Feb. 20, 2026.
U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said on March 11, 2026, that his office will probe China, the European Union, Japan, India, South Korea, Mexico, and 10 other economies for pushing excess manufacturing capacity into global markets. The investigation could support new import duties on items from steel and semiconductors to processed foods and solar panels before summer.
The move is the administration’s most forceful push yet to revive its tariff program after a 6-3 Supreme Court ruling on Feb. 20, 2026, which struck down President Trump’s International Emergency Economic Powers Act duties. Days after that decision, Trump put in place a 10 percent global tariff under Section 122 of the Trade Act of 1974—a balance-of-payments authority he later raised to 15 percent. That tariff, however, lasts only 150 days unless Congress votes to extend it, with a likely expiration around July 24.
Section 301 probes offer an alternative that has no preset time limits or caps on tariff rates. Greer told reporters his office aims to finish the investigations before the 150 days end, which could allow the administration to maintain or increase duties on major trading partners indefinitely. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he expects U.S. tariffs to return to pre-ruling levels by August.
“Our view is that key trading partners have developed production capacity that is really untethered from the market incentives of domestic and global demand,” Greer said at a press briefing.
On March 12, a separate investigation covering about 60 countries was launched to examine whether foreign governments effectively block imports of goods made with forced labor. That probe includes Canada and the United Kingdom, neither of which was listed in the excess-capacity manufacturing inquiry.
The manufacturing inquiry focuses on economies, Greer says, that produce far more than their populations consume, allegedly through subsidies, suppressed wages, state-owned firms, weak environmental enforcement, and currency manipulation. According to administration officials, those practices displace U.S. factories and hinder American manufacturing growth.
The investigations span 20 manufacturing areas, including aluminum, automobiles, batteries, cement, chemicals, electronics, energy products, glass, machine tools, machinery, paper, plastics, processed foods, robotics, satellites, semiconductors, ships, solar modules, steel, and transportation equipment. Several targeted countries reached trade agreements with Washington, including Indonesia, which in February secured a landmark deal removing tariffs on more than 99 percent of U.S. exports to that market.
Unlike the president’s earlier tariff proclamations, Section 301 reviews include public comment periods and hearings. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative will accept written comments through April 15, with a public hearing on manufacturing excess capacity set to begin May 5. A separate hearing on forced labor practices is scheduled for April 28.
The comment docket opened on March 17, giving stakeholders one month to submit input before the deadline. Greer has requested formal consultations with all 16 governments named in the manufacturing investigation.
Canada’s omission from the manufacturing list drew notice, though it is included in the forced labor investigation. The European Union appears on both lists, along with China, Japan, India, South Korea, Vietnam, Mexico, Singapore, Switzerland, Norway, Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand, Taiwan, Bangladesh, and Indonesia.
Greer said further investigations could follow. He told reporters the administration expects to open more Section 301, country-specific probes, potentially covering rice and seafood markets. He added he does not expect new Section 232 national security investigations in the upcoming weeks.
The timing has diplomatic implications. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent met Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng in Paris on March 15 and 16 for trade talks that Bessent described as “very good,” with both sides characterized as candid and constructive. The meetings had been intended to set the stage for President Trump’s state visit to Beijing from March 31 to April 2—the first U.S. presidential trip to China since Trump’s 2017 visit. However, Trump subsequently announced he was delaying the summit by 5 to 6 weeks to remain in Washington and manage the ongoing U.S.-led war with Iran. China, which had never officially confirmed the original dates, said the two sides remain in communication about rescheduling.
Section 301 authority allows the trade representative to impose tariffs, restrict imports, or take other trade actions in response to unfair foreign conduct. The 1974 statute does not set fixed limits on rates or duration, giving the administration considerably more flexibility than the balance-of-payments law that underpins the current global tariff.
The investigations launch as the administration races to reconstruct its tariff framework after the Supreme Court’s February decision. Whether this legal approach holds up better than the previous one will likely be decided by the courts, and by whether Congress extends the Section 122 tariffs before they expire in July.