Lawyers gave feedback this week on recently issued Commerce Department antidumping and countervailing duty regulations, with at least one attorney saying the changes were mostly positive for petitioners. They also discussed challenges faced by different parties during International Trade Commission investigations, and they said they sided with the ITC in its ongoing defense of its treatment of confidential information at the Court of International Trade.
Importer Valeo North America told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit that the Commerce Department violated a "foundational principle of administrative law" in concluding the company's T-series aluminum sheet was covered by antidumping and countervailing duty orders. Commerce failed to follow its "well-established legal framework" in making the scope decision, neglecting its duty as an administrative agency to provide coherent, ascertainable guidance so that regulated parties may anticipate how agencies enforce their rules and regulations," Valeo said (Valeo North America v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 24-1189).
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said on May 20 that the Court of International Trade was wrong to impose a 50% threshold in determining whether demand for a processed agricultural product is "substantially dependent" on its raw upstream iteration for purposes of assigning countervailing duties.
The following are short summaries of recent CBP NY rulings issued by the agency's National Commodity Specialist Division in New York:
Drawing pencils, colored pencils and #2 pencils exported from the Philippines by School Specialty are subject to an antidumping duty order on cased pencils from China, the Commerce Department said in a May 7 scope ruling.
The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on May 20 ruled that the Court of International Trade was wrong to establish a 50% threshold when determining whether demand for an agricultural product is "substantially dependent" on its raw upstream iteration for purposes of assigning countervailing duties. Judges Sharon Prost, William Bryson and Leonard Stark said the Commerce Department has significant leeway in determining whether substantial dependence exists. In the present case, which assessed subsidies to Spanish raw olive growers, the court affirmed Commerce's finding of substantial dependence, finding that errors in the agency's analysis of dependence were nonprejudicial to the affected Spanish ripe olive exporters.
A pair of exporters shouldn't be allowed to pluck "a few words out of context without examining the full language of that scope" in their challenge to a Commerce Department ruling that steel truck wheels made in Thailand with either Chinese-origin rims or discs are subject to the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on steel wheels from China (Asia Wheel Co. v. United States, CIT Consol. # 23-00143).
The International Trade Commission did not properly investigate the actual feasibility or frequency of reshipping excess phosphate fertilizer during a year in which fertilizer supply chains were rocked by unusual events, foreign exporters and domestic importers told the Court of International Trade May 8 in comments opposing a continued affirmative injury finding by the ITC after a remand (OCP v. U.S., CIT Consol. # 21-00219).
The final price EMA Professional Services Corp. pays to its suppliers for precious metal bars after importation is determined according to "an acceptable formula" and meets the "'price actually paid or payable'" standard for purposes of the transaction value method, CBP said. EMA may report any price adjustments through the ACE Reconciliation Program, the agency said in an April 19 customs ruling.
The Court of International Trade on May 9 allowed a case to proceed against the Commerce Department's pause of antidumping and countervailing duties on Southeast Asian solar panels, rejecting motions to dismiss from the government and nine solar cell importers and exporters.