DOJ Launches Global Trade Enforcement Section After $1 Billion Recovery

The United States Department of Justice established the Global Trade & Commerce Enforcement Section within its National Fraud Division to transition from administrative fines toward criminal prosecutions for import and customs fraud. Announced at a U.S. Customs and Border Protection warehouse in Chicago, the move follows the August 2025 launch of the Trade Fraud Task Force, which has recovered or identified more than $1 billion in penalties, settlements, and restitution in less than one year.

Officials credited U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros with spearheading the prosecutions that drove these recoveries. Key actions include a $549.5 million settlement with California-based Perfectus Aluminum for misrepresenting Chinese products and a $54 million recovery from Ceratizit USA, both stemming from whistleblower complaints. The DOJ also filed criminal charges in two Chicago-based cases involving gold jewelry imports. In one instance, Raj and Veena Kohli and their company, Surya International Inc., allegedly smuggled jewelry worth nearly $700 million and falsified records to claim Omani origin to evade over $38 million in duties.

To standardize these efforts, the DOJ released a 27-page Resource Guide to Trade Fraud Enforcement detailing 16 fraud typologies. The new section focuses on illegal imports that violate product safety and anti-forced labor laws, as well as schemes to misreport import values to evade tariffs. This crackdown follows previous administration attempts to increase tariff collections through "Liberation Day" tariffs, though the Supreme Court later ruled the president lacked the authority to impose them.