Changi Esquel Textile (CJE), a Hong Kong-based apparel company and part of the Esquel group of companies, filed for a preliminary injunction on July 19 against its placement on the Commerce Department's Entity List. The company is seeking the injunction even though it expects an announcement soon on potential changes to its status on the list, it said. "The government has informed Plaintiffs that there will likely be a development regarding CJE’s continued Entity List designation by August 1," the company said.

The Commerce Department will review whether Russia is a non-market economy for antidumping duty purposes as part of a less-than-fair-value investigation into urea ammonium nitrate from the country, Commerce said in a notice initiating the investigation. Domestic producer CF Industries Nitrogen and its subsidiaries alleged that Russia was a nonmarket economy in the petition underlying the investigation.

The government rejected the proposal from Section 301 plaintiffs at a U.S. Court of International Trade status conference July 23 that would have entitled importers to refunds from reliquidated customs entries from China with lists 3 and 4A tariff exposure if they prevail on the merits at the end of the litigation.

In dueling briefs filed to the Court of International Trade in a case over the president's decision to reverse a safeguard exemption on bifacial solar panels, the Department of Justice and plaintiffs led by the Solar Energy Industries Association argued over whether a recent U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit opinion is relevant to their case. The decision, Transpacific Steel LLC et al. v. U.S., found that the president could hike Section 232 national security tariffs beyond time limits imposed by the statute (see 2107130059). DOJ in its brief said that the decision lends itself to ruling in the government's favor in the case of the solar panels. SEIA said that the decision has "little relevance" to its case since the decision deals with "an entirely different statute," in its letter (Solar Energy Industries Association et al. v. United States, CIT #29-03941).

The Commerce Department properly found that Shelter Forest International Acquisition's hardwood plywood exports were not later-developed merchandise and therefore did not circumvent the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on hardwood plywood from China, the Court of International Trade said in a July 21 opinion. After initially finding that Shelter Forest's plywood exports were circumventing the orders, Commerce flipped its determination after an initial CIT remand.

The Commerce Department only needs to show the potential for government control to deny separate rate status to a non-market economy exporter, the Court of International Trade said in a July 6 opinion made public on July 21. "A puppet master is no less in control when the strings are slack," CIT Judge M. Miller Baker said in the opinion. To be granted an individual rate, the respondent must prove that its operations are devoid of de facto government control. Since I.D.I. International Development and Investment Corporation failed to do, it failed to obtain an individual rate, the judge said.

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All customs entries from China with Section 301 lists 3 and 4A tariff exposure not yet liquidated as of the U.S. Court of International Trade's July 6 preliminary injunction (PI) order freezing liquidations would liquidate "in the ordinary course" and be refunded to the plaintiff importers at the end of the litigation if they win, Akin Gump lawyers proposed July 20 for sample case plaintiffs HMTX Industries and Jasco Products. Akin Gump seized on the proposal after DOJ lawyers at a status conference July 15 opened the door a crack to the possibility they would support a refund stipulation after months of refusing to do so.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on July 20 backed the Commerce Department's initial decision to adjust a Turkish pipe exporter's post-sale price by only one-third of a late delivery penalty, saying it was supported by substantial evidence. Reversing a ruling from the Court of International Trade, the appellate court held that CIT erred in backing Commerce into adjusting the post-sale price by the entirety of the penalty cost since the customer was not aware of the methodology by which the amount of the penalty was to be determined. The decision brought the antidumping margin for mandatory respondent Borusan Mannesmann Boru Sanayi ve Vicaret's above de minimis to 5.11%.

The Court of International Trade again rejected the Commerce Department's attempt to make a particular market situation adjustment to the cost of production in a sales-below-cost test in an antidumping case, according to a July 19 opinion. Yet again, the court said that such adjustments, resulting in alternative cost methodologies, are reserved for constructed value and not normal value because sales used when calculating normal value must be carried out in the "ordinary course of trade."