The Commerce Department further defended its decision to continue relying on facts otherwise available in Nov. 8 comments submitted to the Court of International Trade, despite a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit opinion finding that such reliance on the current data was inappropriate. The plaintiff in the case, Dillinger France, argued that Commerce ignored the Federal Circuit's directive by continuing to rely on the "likely selling prices" in Dillinger France's records rather than the actual cost of production. Commerce responded that the plaintiff failed to submit the actual product-specific costs of producing the non-prime products or the physical characteristics of the non-prime products, leading to no other choice but to use facts otherwise available (Dillinger France S.A. v. United States, CIT #17-00159).

The Court of International Trade should remand the Commerce Department's particular market situation adjustment to an exporter's constructed value, the exporter, Garg Tube Export, argued in a Nov. 8 brief at CIT. Substantial evidence does not support Commerce's evidence of a PMS existing, so the holding should be remanded, Garg Tube said. Though Commerce correctly reversed its PMS adjustment to its sales-below-cost test for some Garg Tube products on a first remand, the agency should not have found a PMS existed at all for Garg Tube, the exporter said.

Apple, Google, Microsoft, Dell and Tesla will avoid a lawsuit alleging the tech giants benefited from child labor in cobalt mines in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Finding that the plaintiffs -- a group of anonymous individuals -- failed to establish a causal connection between their injuries and the tech companies, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed the case, finding a lack of subject-matter jurisdiction (John Doe I, et al. v. Apple Inc., et al., D.D.C. #19-03737).

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

The Commerce Department wants another chance to consider a countervailing duty review after it learned more about the alleged benefit conferred to the respondent, the Department of Justice said in an unopposed remand motion filed Nov. 8 at the Court of International Trade. In particular, Commerce wants to reconsider a South Korean government program relating to the payments of sewerage fees that allegedly gave respondent Hyundai Steel Co.a countervailable benefit (Hyundai Steel Company v. U.S., CIT #21-00012).

Antidumping duty investigation respondent Hyundai Steel Co.'s arguments against the Commerce Department's particular market situation finding for South Korean hot-rolled coil cannot be considered because they don't apply to Hyundai, the Department of Justice told the Court of International Trade in a Nov. 8 brief. Even if the court were to consider Hyundai's arguments on this issue, nothing in the court's latest opinion in the case precludes Commerce from finding a PMS, the brief said. Rather, CIT only took issue with Commerce's application of the PMS finding.

A recent Commerce Department scope ruling nullifies importer Valeo North America's case at the Court of International Trade, the Department of Justice said in its Nov. 1 motion to dismiss. Seeing as Valeo sought for the court to compel Commerce to issue a final decision on its scope determination, the case is no longer necessary since Commerce actually made the scope decision. Further, CIT doesn't have jurisdiction over the case as Valeo claims, as jurisdiction now rests under a different portion of the law, given Commerce's final agency action, the motion said (Valeo North America v. United States, CIT #21-00426).

An importer says CBP is incorrectly using a purported “transaction value” to appraise its imports of domestically sold goods from a Canadian warehouse, and that CBP should accept its original appraisal using deductive value because no foreign sale for exportation occurred.

Three Court of International Trade cases filed by Janssen Ortho were assigned to Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves and stayed following prompting from Janssen and the Department of Justice. The three orders from CIT stay the cases for 90 days pending the calculation of refunds in another CIT case brought by Janssen since the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued its opinion on appeal. In April, the Federal Circuit upheld Choe-Groves' decision that the active pharmaceutical ingredient imported by Janssen in one of its HIV medications is eligible for duty-free treatment (see 2104260034). Janssen and DOJ requested that Choe-Groves to be assigned to the cases since she presided over the original CIT case (see 2111010072) (Janssen Ortho LLC v. U.S., CIT #13-00052, #14-00094, #14-00198).

The Commerce Department defended its actions to drop its reliance on Malaysian surrogate data in an antidumping duty investigation after the Court of International Trade raised questions over the distortive effects of forced labor in Malaysia. In a brief Nov. 4, Commerce said it was correct to use certain Mexican data instead of the Malaysian data (New American Keg, d/b/a American Keg Co. v. U.S., CIT #20-00008).