The Court of International Trade remanded the Commerce Department's finding that the European Union's Common Agricultural Policy is a de jure specific domestic subsidy of Spain's olive industry in a June 17 opinion. Finding for the second time that Commerce’s interpretation of the statute is contrary to law in a countervailing duty investigation into ripe olives from Spain, Judge Gary Katzmann found that the agency cannot permissibly find that the CAP was a countervailable specific domestic subsidy since “there is no uniform treatment across the agricultural sector in the provision of benefits.” Katzman also found Commerce also cannot permissibly say that raw olives are a “prior stage product” of table olives to find that subsidies to olive growers are attributable to olive producers.
Court of International Trade activity
Oral argument is scheduled for 10 a.m. on June 17 on a motion for a preliminary injunction to freeze liquidation of unliquidated entries from China with lists 3 or 4A tariff exposure in the ongoing litigation over the tariffs led by HMTX and Jasco at the Court of International Trade (see 2106140056). The public can listen through a dial-in audio feed by calling 1-855-244-8681, access code 172 077 0162. There is no need to register to listen to the proceeding, CIT said on its website.
President Donald Trump properly eliminated a tariff exemption for bifacial solar panels since a majority of the representatives of the domestic industry, by volume, filed a petition to remove the exemption, the Department of Justice said in a June 11 brief in the Court of International Trade. Responding to arguments from the Solar Energy Industries Association, the Justice Department contested the trade group's assertion that the withdrawal of the exemption was merely based on a "head count" (Solar Energy Industries Association et al. v. United States, CIT #20-03941).
The Court of International Trade sustained the final results of the second administrative review of the antidumping duty order on steel nails from Oman, in a June 14 decision. Judge Richard Eaton held that there was substantial evidence to back the Commerce Department's decision to use a Japanese company's financial statement to determine constructed value profit and indirect selling expenses for mandatory respondent Oman Fasteners, as opposed to an Indian company's financial statement as favored by petitioner and plaintiff in the case, Mid Continent Steel & Wire.
The Commerce Department will reconsider its decision to reallocate the cost of production for antidumping administrative review respondent Nexteel Co.'s non-prime products to account for their losses when calculating constructed value, the Court of International Trade said in a June 7 ruling made public on June 15. Issuing her second remand in the case brought from steel producers Husteel Co. and Nexteel over the 2016-17 AD administrative review of welded line pipe from Korea, Judge Claire Kelly sustained all other determinations made by Commerce.
It could take two to three years to resolve the massive Section 301 litigation now before the Court of International Trade, especially since it’s “highly likely” the case will be appealed by whichever side loses, David Cohen, a trade expert with Sandler Travis, said on his law firm's webinar June 15. Roughly 3,800 importers are suing the government to declare the lists 3 and 4A tariffs on Chinese goods unlawful and get the money refunded.
The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's remand results in an administrative review of the antidumping duty order on circular welded carbon steel standard pipe and tube products from Turkey in a June 16 decision. The remand results brought Commerce's administrative review in line with the court's orders in a Feb. 17 opinion which told the agency to drop any particular market situation-related adjustments to the cost of production in the sales-below-cost test.
A challenge to Section 232 tariffs on steel “derivatives” brought by Tempo Global Resources will have to wait until after a key appeal in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, the Court of International Trade said in a June 14 stay order. In a related case, PrimeSource Building Products Inc. v. United States, CIT found the tariff expansion onto steel and aluminum derivatives to be in violation of congressionally mandated time limits. On June 4, the Justice Department alerted the court of its intention to appeal to the Federal Circuit (see 2106110040) (Tempo Global Resources LLC v. United States, CIT #20-00066).
A far-reaching legal challenge to Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs brought by ME Global was stayed by the Court of International Trade pending an appeal of a related case in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, according to a June 14 stay order (ME Global, Inc. v. United States, CIT #20-00130) The Federal Circuit case, Universal Steel Products, Inc. v. United States, carries arguments similar to those in ME Global's case in that both claim that procedural requirements were ignored in President Donald Trump's expansion of the tariffs (see 2105250077).
The Court of International Trade is set to hold oral arguments over a key relief question in the massive Section 301 litigation on June 17. Chief Judge Mark Barnett sent out four questions to the parties in a June 14 letter concerning the following: (1) how uncertainty over the court's authority to provide relief establishes that the plaintiffs are likely to suffer irreparable harm without this relief, (2) cases in which the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit found that CIT did not determine appropriate relief, (3) how the first question is articulated by the Supreme Court decision Winter v. Natural Resources Defense Council and (4) the court's authority to enter a money judgment instead of reliquidation in the event the plaintiff's preliminary injunction prevails. The oral arguments will be held over the motion for a preliminary injunction filed by the plaintiffs to freeze the liquidation of unliquidated entries from China with lists 3 and 4A tariff exposure (see 2106070017).