Trade Law Daily is providing readers with the top stories from last week, in case you missed them. All articles can be found by searching on the title or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.

After the Trump administration released a memo outlining the scope of trade action to be taken during his term, one thing became clear, according to a variety of trade attorneys: antidumping duty and countervailing duty rates are about to soar.

The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's decision on remand to drop the use of total adverse facts available against exporter Apiario Diamante Comercial Exportadora, with Apiario Diamante Producao e Comercial de Mel known as Supermel, in the antidumping duty investigation on raw honey from Brazil. The result saw Supermel's AD rate drop from 83.72% to 10.52%.

Court of International Trade Judge Timothy Reif said in a Jan. 27 opinion that the Commerce Department had abused its discretion by denying steel exporter Hoa Phat Steel Pipe Co.’s submission after it was late, but still filed before the opening of the following business day.

Colombian shopping bag exporter Ditar and domestic petitioner Coalition for Fair Trade in Shopping Bags each filed a motion for judgment in their respective cases challenging the results of the same antidumping duty investigation. Ditar, a mandatory respondent, argued the Commerce Department had been required to make a level-of-trade adjustment between its U.S. and home markets, while the Coalition alleged Ditar’s records were unreliable (Ditar v. United States, CIT # 24-00130; Coalition for Fair Trade in Shopping Bags v. United States, CIT # 24-00157).

The Commerce Department "effectuated Congress' intent" when it found that U.S. seafood seller Luscious Seafood is not a bona fide wholesaler of the domestic like product, petitioner Catfish Farmers of America said in a reply brief at the Court of International Trade. The petitioner said that while Congress didn't define the term "wholesaler" in the antidumping laws, the "overall text, structure, and purpose of the law do not reflect any intention to allow parties with merely tangential or fugitive wholesaling activity to force Commerce into action -- particularly for potentially manipulative ends" (Luscious Seafood v. United States, CIT # 24-00069).

The Commerce Department decided not to countervail benefits received by countervailing duty respondent Kaptan Demir from Turkey's Banking and Insurance and Transaction Tax exemptions on remand at the Court of International Trade. The agency said that while there was not enough information to find that the exemptions were de facto specific, it faulted its lack of time on remand to gather sufficient information (Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret v. United States, CIT # 23-00131).

The Commerce Department's exceeded its statutory authority when it revoked an antidumping duty order on the grounds that it never received a notice of intent to participate from an interested domestic party in a sunset review, petitioner Archroma U.S. argued. Filing a reply brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, Archroma said Commerce's authority to ensure the "integrity of its procedures" doesn't allow it to "adopt measures exceeding its statutory authority" (Archroma U.S. v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 24-2159).

The Commerce Department doesn't fail to act when it denies a Section 232 steel and aluminum tariff exclusion request, the Court of International Trade held. Instead, the denial is a "decision" and "not an action unlawfully withheld or unreasonably delayed," Judge Stephen Vaden said, dismissing a host of claims from importer Prysmian Cables and Systems USA against Commerce's rejection of its exclusion requests.

Trade Law Daily is providing readers with the top stories from last week, in case you missed them. All articles can be found by searching on the title or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.