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

The Commerce Department erred in deciding to "smooth" antidumping duty respondent Prolamsa's production costs in the 2022-23 administrative review of the AD order on heavy walled rectangular carbon welded steel pipes and tubes from Mexico, Prolamsa argued in an Oct. 3 complaint at the Court of International Trade (Productos Laminados de Monterrey v. United States, CIT # 25-00195).

The Commerce Department properly decided on remand not to countervail an exemption from Turkey's Banking and Insurance Transactions Tax on foreign exchange transactions, the Court of International Trade held in an Oct. 6 decision. In upholding the 2023 administrative review of the countervailing duty order on steel concrete reinforcing bar from Turkey, Judge Gary Katzmann also sustained Commerce's decision to use a report from Colliers International as the benchmark for valuing the rent-free lease of land to respondent Kaptan's affiliate Nur over a report from Cushman & Wakefield.

Court of International Trade Judge Gary Katzmann remanded Oct. 6 parts of the Commerce Department’s 2021 review of the countervailing duty order on steel rebar from Turkey, asking the department to rework its application of adverse facts available to Kaptan Demir’s use of a social security benefits law, Turkish Law 27256. He agreed the department had based its decision solely on information it had declined to add to the record.

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

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Oct. 3 issued its mandate in an antidumping duty and countervailing duty scope case on importer Valeo North America's T-series aluminum sheet. In August, the Federal Circuit said the Commerce Department properly included Valeo's sheet in the scope of the AD/CVD orders on common alloy aluminum sheet from China (see 2508120034). The court disagreed with the importer as to the ambiguity in the orders' scope and on whether its aluminum sheet falls outside the orders' scope, since it's heat-treated (Valeo North America v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 24-1189).

Importer Detroit Axle opposed the government's motions for an extension of time to respond to the company's motions for leave to amend its complaint and for partial summary judgment in its case against President Donald Trump's decision to end the de minimis threshold for goods from China. Detroit Axle said the U.S. "has failed to establish 'good cause'" for being given another 35 days to respond to the motions to amend and for partial summary judgment if the Court of International Trade dissolves the stay of the case (Axle of Dearborn d/b/a Detroit Axle v. United States, CIT # 25-00091).

Commerce wrongly requested from a mandatory respondent in a countervailing duty administrative review information about five government programs the department never determined were countervailable subsidies, exporter OCP said Sept. 30 (OCP v. United States, CIT Consol. # 24-00227).

The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Sept. 30 vacated a decision from USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service to "switch to a new system for mitigating the risk of a pest outbreak caused by imported Chilean table grapes." Judge Amir Ali held that the action was arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act (California Table Grape Commission v. U.S. Dep't of Ag., D.D.C. # 24-02645).

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Oct. 2 scheduled a pair of cases for oral argument on Nov. 4 regarding the International Trade Commission's policy of redacting business proprietary information in questionnaire responses. The court said the two sides, which are the ITC and two court-appointed amici, will each get 20 minutes, with the two amici -- patent attorney Andrew Dhuey and Alex Moss, the executive director of the Public Interest Patent Law Institute -- splitting their 20 minutes (In Re United States, Fed. Cir. #s 24-1566, 25-127).