Certain Canadian Goods Are Banned From Import on September 29. Arrival Decides, Not Entry

Three proclamations move alcoholic beverages, dairy and motor vehicles from a 50% duty to an outright import ban. Goods that arrive before 12:01 a.m. ET on September 29 can still be entered at 50%. Goods that arrive after cannot come in at all — and CBP has issued no filing guidance yet.

On September 8, 2026 the President signed three proclamations under Section 338 of the Tariff Act of 1930 — 11061 (alcoholic beverages), 11062 (dairy) and 11063 (motor vehicles). They were published on September 14 (91 FR 58311, 58319 and 58325). Each does the same thing: it takes products of Canada that are currently subject to the 50% Section 338 duties and excludes them from importation into the United States.

This is a different instrument from a tariff. Section 338 lets the President impose additional duties up to 50% — that is what happened in July and August. It also authorizes excluding a country's articles from importation altogether if that country "maintains or increases" the discrimination. That second power is rarely used. It is the one now being exercised.

The date that counts is arrival, not entry

Read the two operative paragraphs together, because they do not use the same word:

• The exclusion is effective with respect to goods imported on or after 12:01 a.m. eastern time on September 29, 2026.
• Products subject to the ban that were imported, but not yet entered for consumption or withdrawn from warehouse for consumption, before September 29 remain subject to the 50% duty instead.

So the test is importation — arrival — not the entry filing. A container of covered goods that lands on September 26 and clears on October 3 is still a 50% duty shipment. The same container landing on September 30 is not admissible at any price. If you have covered cargo on the water, the question to ask your carrier this week is the arrival date, and whether it has slipped.

What is covered, and the guidance that does not exist yet

Each proclamation carries its own Annex listing the tariff lines. Two practical cautions. First, the Federal Register prints those annexes as images, so they are not searchable in the text version — work from the PDF, or from CBP's list when it appears. Second, and more important: as of today CBP has issued no CSMS guidance on the import ban. The scope change described below got a CSMS message within three days; the ban, eleven days from taking effect, has none. The filing mechanics — how a banned entry will be rejected, what happens to goods already in a bonded warehouse or a foreign trade zone — are not yet published.

Separately, the duty list itself grew on September 15

Two more proclamations signed the same day — 11064 and 11065 — modified which Canadian products carry the 50% duty, effective September 15, 2026. CBP's guidance (CSMS #69851916) puts it at 122 additional tariff classifications under HTSUS 9903.03.12 and 9903.03.14; the classifications under 9903.03.13 did not change.

The official list attached to that message now runs to roughly 1,230 tariff lines, and the additions marked on it are not where the headlines have been. The largest block by far is furniture and lighting — 36 lines. Then dairy (24), base-metal fittings and mountings (14), paper and paperboard (10) and aluminum (9), with smaller groups in furskins, boats, leather, iron and steel articles, vehicles, and fats and oils. If you import Canadian furniture, that is the sentence that matters to you.

Ten classifications came off the list on the same date. Check these against your own filings rather than against a sector label:

• From 9903.03.12: 2208.30.60, 2208.70.00 (liqueurs and cordials)
• From 9903.03.14: 2501.00.00, 2523.29.00, 2940.00.60, 4803.00.40, 4818.90.00, 7801.10.00, 8537.10.91, 9507.10.00 (fishing rods)

If the ban is struck down, the duty comes back

Each proclamation carries a severability clause that says so explicitly: if the import ban is invalidated as to any import, the 50% duty imposed by the original proclamation applies to that import instead. A successful challenge would not produce duty-free entry. Plan on one of two outcomes, not three.

What to do in the next eleven days

Check your tariff numbers against the annexes, not the sector names. "Dairy" and "motor vehicles" are headlines; the annex is the rule. The same caution applied to the July proclamations, where the one filed as the motor vehicle action turned out to cover agricultural goods, leather, textiles and machinery.

Get the arrival dates for anything already moving. Not the ETA you were given at booking — the current one. A few days of slippage is the whole difference between a 50% duty and cargo that cannot enter.

Decide early what happens to goods that miss the date. Re-export, sale into another market, or storage abroad are decisions with lead times of their own, and they are easier to arrange before a vessel arrives than after.

We arrange clearance into both the United States and Canada. Send us the container and the tariff numbers and we will check them against the covered lists, tell you the current arrival date, and flag anything that is close to the line. Contact us.