An importer of dried seaweed brought a complaint Dec. 4 to the Court of International Trade challenging the reclassification of its seaweed “for the first time in 37 years” (Takaokaya USA v. United States, CIT # 24-00213).
Court of International Trade
The United States Court of International Trade is a federal court which has national jurisdiction over civil actions regarding the customs and international trade laws of the United States. The Court was established under Article III of the Constitution by the Customs Courts Act of 1980. The Court consists of nine judges appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate and is located in New York City. The Court has jurisdiction throughout the United States and has exclusive jurisdictional authority to decide civil action pertaining to international trade against the United States or entities representing the United States.
A 2012 analysis memorandum from a prior antidumping duty determination should be put on the record of a suit on an anti-circumvention proceeding, the Court of International Trade held on Dec. 5. Granting the government's motion to complete the administrative record, Judge Stephen Vaden dubbed the spat "pedantic" and said the record "should be supplemented."
The Court of International Trade on Dec. 4 granted importer Incase Design Corp.'s voluntarily dismissal of its suit on the classification of its iPad and iPhone cases. Incase brought the suit in 2016 to contest CBP's classification of the goods under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheadings 3926.10.00, dutiable at 5.3%, and 3926.90.99, dutiable at 5.3%. The company said the goods should have been classified under subheading 4820.30.00, free of duty, or subheading 8473.30.51, free of duty (Incase Design Corp. v. United States, CIT # 16-00181).
Mexican tomato exporter NS Brands said Dec. 3 that the Commerce Department needed to consider the “prejudice to companies now in existence” that resulted from resuming an antidumping duty investigation from 1996 with the same respondents (Bioparques de Occidente v. United States, CIT Consol. # 19-00204).
Judges at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Dec. 4 questioned importer Nature's Touch Frozen Foods (West) and the government regarding the tariff classification of frozen fruit mixtures. Judge Todd Hughes led the bulk of the questioning, pushing Nature's Touch on how to classify the goods if the court finds that the mixtures aren't food preparations, as claimed by the company, and how they should be classified instead under Harmonized Tariff Schedule heading 0811, which covers certain frozen fruit (Nature's Touch Frozen Foods (West) v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 23-2093).
The Court of International Trade on Dec. 5 let the Commerce Department add an analysis memorandum from a previous antidumping proceeding to the administrative record of an anti-circumvention proceeding on Vietnamese circular welded carbon-quality steel pipe. Judge Stephen Vaden dubbed the spat as "pedantic," and said the memo should be part of the record because it was referenced by both Commerce and respondent SeAH Steel VINA Corp.
The International Trade Commission regulation requiring a party to file an entry of appearance in order to establish standing to sue a commission decision before the Court of International Trade is lawful and in line with the relevant statute, the U.S. said. Replying to importer Pay Less Here's bid to keep its case on the ITC's critical circumstances determination on mattresses from Burma alive, the government said Pay Less doesn't have standing since it failed to file an entry of appearance (Pay Less Here v. United States, CIT # 24-00152).
The Commerce Department properly picked the benchmark data for two subsidy programs received by respondent Jiangsu Zhongji Lamination Materials in the 2017-18 review of the countervailing duty order on aluminum foil from China, the Court of International Trade held in a decision made public Dec. 3.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
An automobile parts exporter’s financial statements aren’t representative of exporter Your Standing International’s home market steel nail sales, Your Standing said Nov. 29 in support of its August motion for judgment (see 2408270046) (Your Standing International v. United States, CIT # 24-00055).