Importer Scottsdale Tobacco launched a case at the Court of International Trade to contest CBP's denial of its drawback claim on its Canadian-origin paper-wrapped cigarettes. Filing a complaint on Jan. 30, the importer said its drawback claim "met the requirements" for a substitution unused merchandise drawback of the federal excise taxes it paid, since it exported the cigarettes from Florida less than five years after the relevant imports (Scottsdale Tobacco v. United States, CIT # 24-00022).

A whistleblower in a False Claims Act challenge, Brutus Trading, petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to take up its case so the court can clear up its own 2023 decision that found the government can voluntarily dismiss a qui tam FCA case brought by a whistleblower after not initially intervening in the case, and that the dismissal would be carried out under Rule 41(a) (Brutus Trading v. Standard Chartered, Sup. Ct. # 23-813).

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

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Jan. 29 issued its mandate in a customs case on the classification of textile gloves with a plastic coating on the palm and fingers. The appellate court said the gloves fit under Harmonized Tariff Schedule heading 6116 as gloves and not as articles of plastic under heading 3926 (see 2312060028). Importer Magid argued that Section XI Note 1(h) excluded the gloves from heading 6116 and that the Federal Circuit's ruling in Kalle USA v. U.S., a case concerning sausage casing, precluded classification as textiles and apparel of Section XI (Magid Glove & Safety Manufacturing Co. v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 22-1793).

The U.S. and three importers filed a joint status report announcing they intend to settle several consolidated cases (see 2108190038) contesting the Commerce Department’s denials of the importers’ Section 233 steel tariff exclusion requests (Valbruna Slater Stainless.v. U.S., CIT #21-00027).

A rebar exporter received a specific subsidy from the Turkish government’s tax exemption program for companies that engage in foreign exchange, the U.S. and countervailing duty petitioner said Jan. 29 in response to that exporter’s motion for summary judgment. They also said the exporter provided unreliable benchmark value data, justifying the Commerce Department’s use of data from the petitioner, the Rebar Trade Action Coalition, instead (Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret v. U.S., CIT #23-00131).

Pipe importers supported CBP's final redetermination on remand that imported Chinese-origin “rough” carbon steel butt-weld pipe fittings, which only undergo the first stage of processing in China, aren't covered by the antidumping duty order on the finished products. They asked for their suspended entries to be liquidated (Norca Industrial Co. v. United States, CIT Consol. # 21-00192).

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

The U.S. swapped out its lead counsel in an antidumping duty case brought by importer Repwire and exporter Jin Tiong Electrical Materials Manufacturer at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit after its counsel, Eric Singley, left DOJ. The government said in a Jan. 26 notice that it will slot DOJ attorney Kelly Geddes into the lead counsel role. Jin Tiong and Repwire filed the appeal to contest the government's finding that Jin Tiong wasn't eligible for a separate AD rate in the 2019-20 AD review of aluminum wire and cable from China because it didn't submit a separate rate application, even though a separate rate questionnaire was accidentally sent to it (Repwire v. U.S. , Fed. Cir. # 23-1933).

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Jan. 26 gave the U.S. another 14 days to file its response to a group of solar panel exporters' bid for rehearing of the appellate court's ruling that President Donald Trump properly revoked a tariff exclusion for bifacial solar panels. The government has until Feb. 16 to submit its brief, which was invited by the court following the rehearing motion (see 2401220027) (Solar Energy Industries Association v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 22-1392).