The Trump administration has launched two sweeping trade investigations covering dozens of countries as it attempts to recover approximately $1.6 trillion in tariff revenue eliminated by a recent Supreme Court ruling.

U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer announced Wednesday that the administration will investigate 16 economies, including the European Union, China, South Korea, and Japan, over whether their governments subsidize excessive factory capacity that disadvantages U.S. manufacturing. A second investigation will examine dozens of countries to determine if their failure to ban goods made by forced labor constitutes an unfair trade practice.

Both investigations are being conducted under Section 301 of the 1974 Trade Act, which requires consultation with targeted countries, public hearings, and industry comment periods. Hearings are scheduled for April 28 and May 5. The process represents a significant change from the emergency authority Trump previously used to impose immediate tariffs through executive orders.

The Supreme Court's February 20 ruling struck down the president's emergency tariff authority, eliminating about $1.6 trillion in expected revenue over the next decade that the administration had planned to use to help offset the cost of tax cuts. Trump subsequently imposed a 10% tariff on all imports under separate legal authority, but that measure can only last 150 days.

According to Congressional Budget Office estimates, Trump's tax cut legislation is projected to add $4.7 trillion to the national debt over a decade. The administration had expected all tariffs to offset about $3 trillion of that cost before the court ruling. The remaining tariffs, including previous duties on China and Canada plus the temporary 10% tariff, are estimated to yield about $668 billion over the next decade.

Trade policy experts note the investigations' unusual breadth, with the first covering roughly 70% of imports and the second covering nearly all imports. Elena Patel of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center said the new approach will make it easier for companies to contest the tariffs, creating uncertainty about actual revenue collection. Economic studies, including research from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Harvard University economists, have found that American companies and consumers pay the cost of tariffs rather than foreign countries.