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On September 21, 2026, the NAM filed an amicus brief asking the 5th Circuit to find that the economic substance doctrine—used by the Internal Revenue Service to disallow tax benefits for certain transactions—does not apply to transactions for which the tax code specifically authorizes tax-beneficial treatment. Unfortunately, recent caselaw has muddled the economic substance analysis, effectively allowing the IRS to “declare any transactions it does not like to be within the doctrine.” Our brief argues that courts must make a threshold determination as to whether the doctrine is relevant to a transaction before proceeding to apply it and block tax benefits. By failing to make this relevancy determination at the outset, courts expand the reach of the doctrine beyond Congress’s intent, nullifying carefully developed policy judgements regarding which transactions should receive tax benefits that allow manufacturers to compete in a global economy.