Bringin Wine in by car from Mexico
 

Hi there, so I know there is a limit of 1 liter per person for wine, if you are a California resident coming back to California from Mexico by car. But this rule doesn't apply for airplanes. Does anyone know if there's a way for me to get a case of lovely wine back for my own personal use?

I've never been charged. The duty is only a couple bucks a bottle and the agent will likely not bother to charge.

However... The risk might be that they enforce state laws, some of which can be quite restrictive. Where are you crossing the border and what state do you reside in?

The 1 liter "limitation" is that's the amount a person can bring into the country "duty free". You can bring in more but you may have to pay duty on the "overage".

Basically, you can bring in a "reasonable amount" for you own consumption without having an import license but you'll pay customs duty. Sometimes if it's just a case the customs agent may waive the duty.

We have brought wine back from Italy over the liter limit. We always declare it, we are always waved through. Usually the customs agents are just too busy to stop and figure out the tariffs. We are always prepared to pay the tariff, someday we might get shuttled aside for that. IMO it is more a matter of attitude and honesty.

<i>Basically, you can bring in a "reasonable amount" for you own consumption without having an import license but you'll pay customs duty.</i>

There is some nuance here, which I think is the OP's concern... The CBP does enforce state laws regarding importation and some of them can be restrictive and arbitrary. It sounds like the one in question (which I didn't fully grasp when I wrote my initial response) is that CA residents can only bring 1 liter back from Mexico if crossing the CA-Mexico border by car or foot. Non-CA residents and CA residents arriving by plane can bring back something like 5 cases of wine.

Now, I don't know exactly what enforcement is like, but that is the law and the CBP says they enforce them. While not exactly the same as this case, I have heard many stories about seizures of alcohol when people arrive (by plane) at SLC, due to Utah's restrictive laws being enforced.

Yeah I'm a California resident and would be crossing into San ysidro by car. It seems like 3 is the limit but it's ridiculous to me that if I were flying, I could bring in 5 cases!!! That seems odd.

Well you can bring it in and take the chance of having it seized and losing what you paid for it.