The Court of International Trade on April 24 sustained CBP's decision on remand to find that importer Columbia Aluminum Products didn't evade the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on aluminum extrusions from China, but held that CBP wasn't required to immediately reverse the interim measures on the company upon making a negative remand finding. Judge Timothy Stanceu said that the remand decision "is not in effect prior to the court's sustaining it through the entry of judgment."
The Court of International Trade on April 22 sent back the Commerce Department's decision not to attribute subsidies received by lumber suppliers to respondents in an expedited countervailing duty review on Canadian softwood lumber. Judge Mark Barnett said that if Commerce continues to find that the respondents are the producers of the subject lumber, the agency must reconsider its decision to require an upstream subsidy allegation for lumber purchases within the class of covered merchandise.
Importer MKI Enterprise Group, doing business as Winbo USA, filed a complaint at the Court of International Trade on April 22 to contest CBP's denial of a Section 301 exclusion for its entries of "steel side protective attachments for motor vehicles, specifically side bars, fern bars, and bars" from China (MKI Enterprise Group v. United States, CIT # 22-00131).
The Court of International Trade again remanded the Commerce Department's remand results in the 2018 review of the countervailing duty order on carbon and alloy steel cut-to-length plate from South Korea, in an April 19 confidential opinion. In a letter to the litigants, Judge Mark Barnett gave the parties until April 26 to review the confidential information in the opinion. Barnett said Commerce shall "reconsider or further explain" its decision not to investigate the off-peak sale of electricity allegedly for less than adequate remuneration.
The Court of International Trade on April 19 sent back the International Trade Commission's decision to cumulate imports of oil country tubular goods (OCTG) from Argentina, Mexico, Russia and South Korea, in part because the commission failed to take into account the effect of U.S. sanctions on Russia in assessing whether the Russian goods compete at the same level of competition as the good from the other nations.
A manufacturer must have attributed to them all subsidies received by a cross-owned input supplier’s upstream product that is “primarily dedicated to the production of the downstream product,” a domestic petitioner said in an April 17 brief before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. It also argued that the “downstream product” doesn’t need to be “subject merchandise” (Gujarat Fluorochemicals v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 24-1268).
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit dismissed the government's appeal of a Court of International Trade decision scrapping a customs bond penalty action against surety firm American Home Assurance Co. The U.S. voluntarily dismissed the case (see 2404170042) (U.S. v. American Home Assurance Co., Fed. Cir. # 24-1069).
Alpinestars, an Italian exporter of motorcycle safety apparel, brought a short complaint to the Court of International Trade on April 18 (Alpinestars, SPA v. U.S., CIT # 11-00007).
The Commerce Department misapplied the presumption of foreign state control by framing it as a burden on antidumping and countervailing duty respondents to "completely disprove potential government control," exporter Guizhou Tyre Co. argued in an April 18 reply brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (Guizhou Tyre Co. v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-2165).
The Court of International Trade on April 22 remanded parts of the Commerce Department's 2015 expedited review of the countervailing duty order on softwood lumber products from Canada. Judge Mark Barnett sent back the agency's decision not to account for subsidies received by lumber suppliers to the CVD respondents and its decision to use exporter Fontaine's 2014 fiscal year tax returns to conduct benefit calculations for the 2015 review period. Barnett sustained Commerce's instructions to CBP to liquidate entries from companies that received de minimis rates without regard to CV duties, along with the agency's finding that Canadian and Quebecois logging tax credits were countervailable benefits.