Trade Court Rejects US Steel's Requests to Redact Parts of Decision on Section 232 Exclusion Denials
The Court of International Trade rejected U.S. Steel Corp.'s bid to redact portions of the court's recent decision remanding 31 Section 232 exclusion requests. Judge M. Miller Baker said a showing of good cause alone isn't enough to shield discovery materials after they have been introduced at trial or submitted "in connection with dispositive motions," noting the need for transparency in the judicial system and presumption of public access to court proceedings.
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U.S. Steel sought redactions for four pieces of information in the opinion, the first of which concerned its representations made regarding importer California Steel Industries' Section 232 exclusion requests made in 2018. U.S. Steel said it publicly told Commerce that it could supply the covered steel slab within eight weeks -- a fact the agency then relied on in denying the importer's request.
Then in a confidential filing with Commerce, U.S. Steel "said something different -- that it could not provide slab beyond the companies’ contract amount until a date in 2018 that was more than eight weeks after the former sought its exclusions." While U.S. Steel said this information is sensitive since it relates to the company's capacity to provide specific slab products on very short notice, Baker noted that the information is "more than six years old."
As a result, U.S. Steel failed to explain "with particularity how disclosure of this old data can impair its current competitive position," the judge held, adding that even if the information wasn't stale, the company's claim that it could supply slab within eight weeks "waived any confidentiality claim about its concession undermining that same assertion."
U.S. Steel also sought to redact its statement that California Steel indicated it was "not comfortable with a higher volume" in the supply contract between the two companies. Baker kept the statement public, finding that U.S. Steel "publicly disclosed the same information in its surrebuttal," waiving any confidentiality claim.
The objector also asked the court to issue a public summary of an email from California Steel that was submitted to Commerce regarding the importer's 2020 exclusion requests. Again, Baker said no, finding that U.S. Steel "disclosed the substance of that email on the public record when it told Commerce that [California Steel] 'delayed October 2019 spot sale negotiations.'" Any resulting damage to U.S. Steel's negotiating position with other customers as a result of this disclosure "has already occurred," the decision said.
Lastly, U.S. Steel sought redaction of the exact tonnage it supplied California Steel in the first half of 2020, claiming that revealing the precise volume could impact its current and future business dealings with other customers. Baker said the company "doesn’t explain how or why that’s so," adding that, again, subject-matter waiver applies, given that the company put on the public record the "precise tonnage" it sold California Steel in 2018 and 2019.
(California Steel Industries v. United States, Slip Op. 24-138, CIT # 21-00015, dated 12/13/24; Judge: Miller Baker)