The Court of International Trade in a Dec. 20 opinion denied an injunction bid pending appeal from certain plaintiffs in an attorney conflict-of interest suit. After recently rejecting the plaintiffs' motion for a preliminary injunction for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, Judge Gary Katzmann this time rejected the injunction motion pending appeal since the appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit "has not yet been noticed," but even if it had, the injunction "is unwarranted." Katzmann said that the plaintiffs fail to both show a "strong showing of success on the merits" and prove that they will suffer irreparable harm without the injunction.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Court of International Trade in a pair of Dec. 16 opinions upheld the Commerce Department's decisions on remand to exclude importers Worldwide Door Components' and Columbia Aluminum Products' door thresholds from the scope of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on aluminum extrusions from China. After previously remanding the decision for not being submitted in a form that was judicially reviewable, Judge Timothy Stanceu said that this time around the agency has made a scope decision "in a form the court is able to sustain."
The Court of International Trade on Dec. 19 ruled that the Commerce Department improperly excluded certain solar cell sales from consolidated antidumping duty respondent Inventec Solar Energy Corp.'s (ISEC's) dumping margin based on its finding that ISEC did not have any actual or constructive knowledge that its goods would ultimately end up in the United States. Judge Leo Gordon said that given "the totality of the record, the court cannot sustain as reasonable" the finding that ISEC did not have actual knowledge of the solar cells' destination.
CBP improperly found that importer Diamond Tools Technology made a "material and false" statement in the agency's Enforce and Protect Act evasion finding, the Court of International Trade ruled in a Dec. 16 opinion. Sending the case back to CBP again, Judge Timothy Reif ruled that the agency's use of the EAPA statute is inconsistent with the law's language and structure, and even if its use was legal, its interpretation of the statute is not entitled to deference. Diamond Tools properly classified its merchandise as not covered merchandise given the guidance it had at the time, the judge said.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Commerce Department stuck by its decision to rely on antidumping duty respondent Dillinger's books and records to find the cost of production (COP) for non-prime products, the agency said in Dec. 15 remand results submitted to the Court of International Trade. Commerce said that relying on Dillinger's books and records, or the recorded total costs assigned to the prime and non-prime goods, was the "only reasonable approach" (AG der Dillinger Huttenwerke v. United States, CIT #17-00158).
The Commerce Department properly used adverse facts available for countervailing duty respondents' alleged use of China's Export Buyer's Credit Program, the Court of International Trade held in a Dec. 8 opinion made public Dec. 16. Judge Timothy Reif penned the trade court's second opinion upholding the use of AFA for the EBCP after a string of court decisions rejected the use of AFA for the program. The judge held that certain information that Commerce was not given by the Chinese government was critical to verifying non-use of the EBCP, given that the respondents' customers failed to submit non-use certifications.
The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
A recent Court of International Trade decision in Goodluck India v. U.S. is relevant in a case on the Commerce Department's continued antidumping duty investigation on tomatoes from Mexico conducted after a suspension agreement was terminated, plaintiffs in another case, led by Bioparques de Occidente, claimed in a Dec. 14 notice of supplemental authority. In Goodluck, the trade court said that the U.S. cannot dismiss an alternatively pleaded ground of jurisdiction in a motion to dismiss for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction (see 2212010024). Bioparques' case presents a similar scenario, the brief said (Bioparques de Occidente v. U.S., CIT Consol. #19-00204).