The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
Court of International Trade activity
An in lieu of verification (ILV) questionnaire cannot substitute for an actual verification of information submitted as part of a countervailing duty proceeding, Turkish exporter Teknik Aluminyum Sanayi said in a June 24 complaint at the Court of International Trade. Challenging the Commerce Department's use of adverse facts available in a CVD investigation of common alloy aluminum sheet from Turkey, Teknik said that Commerce did not provide adequate notice that the exporter's filings were deficient as is required (Teknik Aluminyum Sanayi A.S. v. United States, CIT 21-00251).
The Commerce Department again reversed course on applying a particular market situation adjustment to the cost of production for South Korean steel in an antidumping review, and those remand results were sustained by the Court of International Trade in a June 24 decision.
Counsel for an alleged transshipper in a duty evasion scheme, Kingtom Aluminio, plans to ask the Court of International Trade to reconsider a decision it made to deny the company the right to intervene in a case challenging the determination of evasion. In an Enforce and Protect Act case concerning duties on aluminum extrusions from China, CBP found that importer Global Aluminum Distributor evaded the duties by bringing in the extrusions via Kingtom in the Dominican Republic. Global Aluminum says that Kingtom was the actual manufacturer of the goods in question (Global Aluminum Distributor LLC v. U.S., CIT #21-00198).
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
A customs case from importer Strategic Import Supply should not be reconsidered in light of new evidence since it is merely an attempt by the plaintiff to "relitigate arguments already raised," the Department of Justice said in a June 23 response to SIS's motion to reconsider the case. The plaintiff failed to satisfy the high burden for reconsideration, DOJ said in the Court of International Trade, and also is not entitled to amend its complaint to change the jurisdictional grounds of its claim (Acquisition 362, LLC v. United States, CIT #20-03762).
The Court of International Trade upheld the Commerce Department's finding that Zhejiang Machinery Import & Export Corp. failed to rebut the presumption of de facto government control, thus barring it from receiving a separate antidumping rate, CIT said in a June 23 decision. The ruling leaves ZMC with the 92.84% China-wide rate in an antidumping administrative review on tapered roller bearings and parts thereof, finished or unfinished, from China.
The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's remand results dropping a particular market situation adjustment to the cost of production for antidumping duties on South Korean heavy walled rectangular welded carbon steel pipes and tubes, in a June 24 decision. Mandatory respondent Dong-A Steel Co. is now set to see its dumping margin drop to 11%, and Kukje Steel Co. to 7.89%. Since HiSteel was not party to the litigation, it's "not entitled to revised rates calculated on remand," Katzmann said.
The Court of International Trade in a June 22 decision dismissed all but one of importer Maple Leaf Marketing's claims against Section 232 steel tariffs levied against goods shipped to Canada for further processing then reimported to the U.S. Finding that the president has broad authority to determine the "nature of the action necessary to adjust imports that threaten the national security," a three-judge panel tossed Maple Leaf's challenges to the imposition of the tariffs on Canada, which Maple Leaf had argued was untimely, as well as to the assessment of Section 232 duties on steel articles qualifying for repair and alteration treatment under Chapter 98, among other things.
The Commerce Department, under protest, dropped a cost-based particular market situation adjustment to the sales-below-cost test in an antidumping administrative review in June 22 remand results submitted to the Court of International Trade. The agency recalculated the weighted-average dumping margins of mandatory respondents Hyundai Steel Company and Husteel Co. in the 2016-17 review of circular welded non-alloy steel pipe from Korea. Husteel, the plaintiff in the case, received a 6.44% antidumping rate, down from 10.91%, while Hyundai received a 4.82% rate -- down from 8.14% before litigation (Husteel Co., Ltd. v. U.S., CIT #19-00107).