Importer Amcor Flexibles Singen GmbH filed a stipulated judgment at the Court of International Trade in its customs suit on the classification of its aluminum foil entries. The judgment said the goods are to be classified under duty-free Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 7607.20.50, which covers other backed aluminum foil. CBP initially classified the goods under subheading 3921.90.40, which covers flexible products with textile components in which man-made fibers predominate by weight over any other single textile fiber. The product at issue is "20-micron aluminum foil, soft-temper, plain, bright side lacquer laminated to a 12-micron PET film" (Amcor Flexibles Singen GmbH v. United States, CIT # 16-00200).
Importer Scioto Valley Woodworking opposed April 2 a Commerce Department finding on remand (see 2501310016) that it had evaded antidumping and countervailing duties (American Kitchen Cabinet Alliance v. United States, CIT # 23-00140).
The New Civil Liberties Alliance filed a lawsuit on behalf of paper importer Emily Ley Paper, doing business as Simplified, on April 3 challenging President Donald Trump's use of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) to impose 20% tariffs on all goods from China. Filing suit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida, Simplified laid out three constitutional and statutory claims against the use of IEEPA to impose tariffs and one claim that the tariffs violate the Administrative Procedure Act for unlawfully modifying the Harmonized Tariff Schedule (Emily Ley Paper, doing business as Simplified v. Donald J. Trump, N.D. Fla. # 3:25-00464).
The U.S. pushed back April 2 against a petitioner’s motion -- with a defendant-intervenor exporter’s consent -- to stay a challenge to the countervailing duty order review of Indian-origin pneumatic off-the-road tires (Titan Tire Corp. v. United States, CIT # 24-00207).
The Court of International Trade sent back the Commerce Department's use of UN Comtrade data in the benchmark price for plywood and the use of adverse facts available to find that certain input suppliers are government "authorities" in both the 2019 and 2020 reviews of the countervailing duty order on multilayered wood flooring from China. Issuing a pair of decisions on the reviews on April 3, Judge Timothy Reif said that while Commerce permissibly found that the Chinese government failed to submit adequate information regarding the input suppliers, the agency ultimately didn't give the foreign government proper notice or opportunity to remedy its deficiencies.
The Court of International Trade dismissed two customs cases, one brought by Meijer Distribution and one by Printing Textiles, for failure to prosecute. Both were put on the customs case management calendar but were not removed before the expiration of the "applicable period of time of removal." Meijer's case concerned whether its hand soap entries of Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 3401.30.50 were properly hit with Section 301 tariffs (see 2303130060). Meanwhile, the case from Printing Textiles, doing business as Berger Textiles, was on whether its coated fabric imports were properly subject to antidumping duties (see 2303150073). Neither attorney for either company responded to our requests for comment (Meijer Distribution v. United States, CIT # 23-00061) (Printing Textiles v. United States, CIT # 23-00062).
Rebar exporter Kaptan Demir argued that the U.S. failed to defend the Commerce Department's position in the 2021 countervailing duty review on steel concrete rebar from Turkey that exemptions from Turkey's Banking and Insurance Transactions Tax (BITT) are de jure specific. Filing a reply brief at the Court of International Trade on March 30, Kaptan said the government's position that Kaptan failed to provide evidence that every Turkish company is eligible for the exemption is "factually incorrect" (Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret v. U.S., CIT #24-00096).
The Court of International Trade in a pair of decisions on April 3 remanded both the 2019 and 2020 reviews of the countervailing duty order on multilayered wood flooring from China. In both decisions, Judge Timothy Reif sent back the Commerce Department's use of UN Comtrade data in setting a benchmark price in assessing the provision of plywood for less than adequate remuneration and the agency's use of adverse facts available to find that certain input suppliers are government "authorities." On the second point, Reif said Commerce appropriately found that the Chinese government's submissions were insufficient but that the agency didn't give the Chinese government proper notice or opportunity to remedy these deficiencies. In the 2019 review, Reif also remanded Commerce's benchmark price for veeners, though the judge sustained the benchmark for inland freight and use of AFA to find use of China's Export Buyer's Credit Program.
The Commerce Department properly found that the provision of mining rights by the Moroccan government didn't confer a benefit to countervailing duty respondent OCP and that the provision of port services was not countervailable, the Court of International Trade held on April 1.
The following lawsuit was filed recently at the Court of International Trade: