Now THAT is something I would fight in court!
I do not see any way that CBP can be justified in retroactively charging additional duty from that far back. There is no way an importer could be aware of them not being charged the correct fee because this ruling only came down last June. If CBP has a problem with the new duty fees vs the old ones - that is their problem.
While I am not a lawyer to me it would be the same as retroactively changing (increasing) the punishment for crimes -- that is definitely not allowed.
Do you think for 1 minute that they will try the same thing and go after companies because Tariffs got raised/enacted? Oh yeah, the automakers, steel users, etc would just LOVE that...
We have the same retroactive corrections, six figures as well, cant fight in court. At the end of the day, if you import, its your job to know what hts code to use, and correct the import docs if incorrect. The ruling is only technically a clarification of a status that already existed.
This is a huge cash grab now for the gov, they will eventually hit every import from bitmain ever.
Lesson learned i think is dont write a letter requesting a tariff classification ruling. I think people have no concept how much that one letter cost the industry.