About a decade after concluding her 10 years of service in the U.S. Army, Beth Benike of Oronoco, Minnesota, became a mother for the first time\u2014and came up with her first idea for a small business.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI had the idea for an invention that would stop babies from dropping and throwing everything on the ground [during meals] and provide a clean place for their food when you take them out to the restaurant\u2014kind of keep them busy,\u201d Benike recalled in an interview with The Dispatch this week. And thus the Busy Baby Mat<\/a> was born in 2017 when Benike \u201ccut and glued some things together to make what I now know was a prototype.\u201d<\/p>\n After making her first sale in 2019, Benike got a big break with a 2021 appearance on the popular TV show Shark Tank<\/a> that features aspiring entrepreneurs. She later inked deals to have her product sold in Target and Walmart.\u00a0<\/p>\n Things had been looking up for Benike and her small business\u2019s five employees\u2014until President Donald Trump announced his \u201cLiberation Day\u201d tariffs on April 2, 2025. At the time, Benike had a container ready to ship from China with $160,000 of product. \u201cMy tariff was going to be like an additional $230,000 on top of that,\u201d Benike recalled. \u201cI would have had to come up with that money within the 30 to 45 days it takes for this stuff to get to America.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Benike could not afford the $230,000 tariff, so her product languished in China until Trump later reduced tariffs below their \u201cLiberation Day\u201d highs (yet still higher than they were at the start of the year). But the damage had been done: For two months, her product was out of stock. Over the past year, Benike had to cut staff from five employees to three. \u201cI cashed in my retirement and didn\u2019t pay myself all summer, went through all my family savings to just stay afloat,\u201d Benike said. \u201cI would say, conservatively, we had half a million in lost revenue because of the tariffs.\u201d<\/p>\n Benike and other small business owners like her could find some relief if the U.S. Supreme Court rules that Trump overstepped his legal authority when he issued tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA)\u2014a ruling that could come as soon as today. If the court rules against Trump, Benike could potentially get a refund<\/a> for some of the $50,000 in tariffs she did pay over the past year, but that would hardly be the end of her troubles.\u00a0<\/p>\n Uncertain of how quickly such refunds could be sent to the many thousands of Americans who paid IEEPA tariffs, Benike plans to join a class action lawsuit in hopes of expediting the process. Her bigger worry is whether the Trump administration will find a way to unilaterally reinstate tariffs through other provisions of the law<\/a>. \u201cThey\u2019ve already announced that they will still be reinstating tariffs under other codes that may or may not affect me,\u201d she told The Dispatch. \u201cIf there\u2019s anything certain about this administration, it\u2019s that everything is uncertain.\u201d<\/p>\n One thing that is certain?\u00a0 Trump just likes tariffs<\/a>. \u201cWe got rich because of tariffs,\u201d Trump told House Republicans at a retreat in January. Last week, the president threatened<\/a> to back primary challengers to any Republicans who vote to overturn his tariffs.<\/p>\n Another thing we know with certainty is that, contrary to Trump\u2019s claims, Americans and not foreigners are the ones paying for his tariffs. A study released by Kiel Institute for the World Economy in January found that American importers and consumers are absorbing 96 percent of the cost of Trump\u2019s tariffs<\/a>, while foreign exporters are eating just 4 percent of the cost. U.S. tariff revenue was roughly $24 billion per month<\/a> higher in 2025 than it was in 2024.<\/a><\/p>\n When you combine Trump\u2019s relentless desire to impose tariffs, the shaky legal ground upon which he has issued tariffs, and the fact that tariffs are paid by Americans, it all adds up to a very uncertain and chaotic business environment. Small business owners, the Americans who have the greatest difficulty in navigating the new tariff regime, told The Dispatch this week that uncertainty may be the biggest challenge they face.<\/p>\n