The Court of International Trade cannot set aside case law finding that subassemblies do not qualify for the finished merchandise exclusion in antidumping and countervailing duty order scope rulings, Judge Stephen Vaden said in a Dec. 6 opinion. Siding with the Commerce Department over plaintiffs China Customs Manufacturing and Greentec Engineering, the court said the plaintiffs' solar roof mountings fall within the scope of the AD/CVD orders on aluminum extrusion from China.

U.S. Steel was again denied the right to intervene in a Section 232 exclusion denial challenge at the Court of International Trade, with the court holding that the Pennsylvania steel company did not have a legally protectable interest in the case. According to the Dec. 3 opinion, U.S. Steel cannot intervene in the case since it won't be directly affected by the case's outcome. Judge Claire Kelly said that any harm that U.S. Steel would experience as a result of the court granting a Section 232 exclusion would be indirect since the company has no right to the sale of the covered products.

The Commerce Department has given no reason why South Korean steel company SeAH Steel Corp. should be penalized via a delayed remand submission because "Commerce has chosen to procrastinate" on a delayed remand in another case, SeAH told the Court of International Trade in a Dec. 2 brief (SeAH Steel Corporation v. United States, CIT #20-00150).

The International Trade Commission should revoke the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on polyethylene terephthalate (PET) resin from Canada, China, India and Oman due to the U.S. industry already running at full capacity and undertaking market distorting practices, PET resin consumers will tell the ITC during a sunset review of the orders. The PET resin consumers, including members of the International Bottled Water Association (IBWA), note the inflationary effect the AD/CVD orders on PET resin have on their prices and mark the orders as one of the factors contributing to unsustainable price hikes amid shortages in one of bottled water's essential inputs.

The Commerce Department properly gave a non-mandatory respondent a non-de minimis countervailing duty rate in a CVD administrative review despite the fact that both of the actual mandatory respondents received de minimis rates, the Court of International Trade said in a Dec. 2 opinion. Judge Claire Kelly held that the "expected method" for calculating duties for non-mandatory respondents only applies in the antidumping duty context, and not to CV duty proceedings.

The Department of Justice's insistence on defending the Commerce Department's position regarding China's Export Buyer's Credit Program in countervailing duty investigations is "mystifying" seeing as it refuses to appeal the issue after multiple defeats at the Court of International Trade, respondent Both-Well (Taizhou) Steel Fittings Co. said in a Nov. 30 brief (Both-Well (Taizhou) Steel Fittings v. U.S., CIT #21-00166).

The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security is violating Belgian shipping company Exmar Marine's Fourth and Fifth amendment rights by blocking its ability to sell an aircraft it owns, Exmar alleged in a Dec. 1 complaint. Arguing its case in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Exmar said BIS has no legal authority to stop the sale of the aircraft and that such action to do so cuts against constitutional protections against unreasonable seizure and violations of due process (Exmar Marine, NV v. Bureau of Industry and Security, D.C. Cir. #21-3141).

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The Commerce Department must reconsider its use of an adverse inference in an antidumping review on Italian pasta since it failed to find out whether a respondent did not to cooperate to the best of its ability, the Court of International Trade said in a Nov. 30 opinion. However, the court upheld the remaining elements of the decision, including Commerce's use of facts available and the agency's rejection of the respondent's post-verification arguments for different classification systems for the pasta's protein content and shape.

After Switzerland banned flights from Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, Zimbabwe and South Africa, the World Trade Organization had to postpone the 12th Ministerial Conference that was due to start Nov. 30. A news release from Nov. 26 quoted Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala saying that the travel restrictions would have put delegations from Southern Africa at a disadvantage. "She pointed out that many delegations have long maintained that meeting virtually does not offer the kind of interaction necessary for holding complex negotiations on politically sensitive issues," the release said.