The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:

CBP's Office of Regulations & Rulings legally reversed the Trade Remedy & Law Enforcement Directorate's finding that Dominican company Kingtom Aluminio evaded the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on aluminum extrusions from China, the U.S. argued in an Aug. 23 reply brief at the Court of International Trade. The government said that OR&R lawfully decided not to apply adverse inferences against Kingtom as requested by petitioner Aluminum Extrusions Fair Trade Committee (Aluminum Extrusions Fair Trade Committee v. United States, CIT # 22-00236).

The Commerce Department legally levied adverse facts available related to China's Export Buyer's Credit Program and applied a 17% value-added tax rate in calculating the benchmark for the Chinese government's provision of primary aluminum for less than adequate remuneration, countervailing duty petitioner Aluminum Association Common Alloy Aluminum Sheet Trade Enforcement Working Group argued (Jiangsu Alcha Aluminum Co. v. United States, CIT # 22-00290).

The government’s position in a case regarding substitution unused merchandise drawback for aircraft parts would lead to "absurd results" if upheld, presenting a "significant risk of manipulation or unintended results" arising from changes in statistical language in the tariff schedule if the court agrees with DOJ's interpretation of the drawback statute, importer Spirit Aerosystems said in an Aug. 18 reply brief at the Court of International Trade (Spirit Aerosystems v. U.S., CIT # 20-00094).

The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:

Exporter Oman Fasteners is drafting its own petition for a writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court of the U.S. in the case on then-President Donald Trump's expansion of the Section 232 duties to include steel and aluminum "derivative" products. In an Aug. 21 letter to the high court, counsel for Oman Fasteners said that as a plaintiff-appellee aligned with importer PrimeSource Building Products -- the lead appellee in the suit at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit -- it supports PrimeSource's cause and will file a brief "within the timeframe permitted" by the law and the court's rules (PrimeSource Building Products v. United States, Sup. Ct. # 23-69).

A CBP Center of Excellence and Expertise improperly classified an imported organometallic substance, then compounded its own classification error by taking too long to forward an application for further review of the protest to CBP headquarters so that CBP HQ was unable to weigh in, importer Lanxess said in an Aug. 21 complaint at the Court of International Trade (Lanxess Corporation v. U.S., CIT # 23-00073).

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit in an Aug. 21 summary order affirmed a New York district court's dismissal of Brutus Trading's qui tam False Claims Act against Standard Chartered, which accused the financial firm of facilitating illegal banking transactions on behalf of sanctioned parties. After Brutus filed the qui tam case, in which a party with evidence of fraud against the U.S. government can file a lawsuit on behalf of the government, the U.S. then moved to toss the matter after finding that the "factual allegations were unsupported," the legal theory "was not cognizable, and the continuation of the suit would waste considerable government resources" (Brutus Trading v. Standard Chartered Bank, 2nd Cir. # 20-2578).

The Court of International Trade on Aug. 22 upheld the Commerce Department's exclusion of hardwood plywood made by Vietnam Finewood using two-ply panels imported into Vietnam from China from the scope of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on hardwood plywood from China. Judge Mark Barnett in an Aug. 22 opinion said the move was in line with his prior order instructing the agency to "issue a scope ruling consistent with the unambiguous terms" of the orders' scope.

The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade: