The Court of International Trade on March 20 sustained the International Trade Commission's decision not to cumulate goods from Brazil with other countries that are part of the five-year sunset review of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on cold-rolled steel flat products from Brazil, China, India, Japan, South Korea and the U.K. Judge Gary Katzmann held that the commission's analysis didn't "engage in impermissibly 'circular' reasoning," the ITC's treatment of Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs didn't impermissibly depart from past agency practice and the commission appropriately explained its decision not to cumulate Brazil's goods.
Section 232 Tariffs
The United States currently maintains a 25% tariff on steel imports and 10% on tariff on aluminum imports under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962. In 2018, the Trump administration imposed Section 232 Tariffs on steel and aluminum imports into the United States, citing national security concerns. The U.S. agreed to lift tariffs on Canada and Mexico after the signing of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), and reached deals with the European Union, Japan and other countries to replace the tariffs with quotas for steel and aluminum imports into the U.S.
The Court of International Trade's mediation in a challenge from importer California Steel Industries seeking exclusions from Section 232 steel and aluminum duties "did not result in a settlement," the court said in a Feb. 2 report of mediation. While Judge M. Miller Baker presides over the case, Judge Leo Gordon served as "Judge Mediator" for the process, which wrapped up Feb. 1 (California Steel Industries v. U.S., CIT # 21-00015).
Turkey will appeal a World Trade Organization dispute panel finding against its retaliatory duties on certain U.S. goods, the WTO announced Jan. 31. Because the Appellate Body is nonfunctional as the U.S. prevents vacancies from being filled, the appeal goes "into the void." As a result, Turkey's tariffs may stand without further rebuke from the WTO.
Home Depot on Jan. 10 dropped its lawsuit in the Court of International Trade challenging the president's authority to expand Section 232 national security tariffs beyond procedural deadlines. The U.S. Supreme Court this week denied a petition for writ of certiorari from steel nail maker Oman Fasteners, marking the sixth time the court has declined to address whether President Donald Trump legally expanded Section 232 duties on steel and aluminum derivatives (see 2401080037). Counsel for Home Depot confirmed in an email that its case was abandoned following the Supreme Court's most recent rejection (Home Depot USA v. U.S., CIT # 22-00014).
DOJ and steel importer NLMK Pennsylvania are awaiting word from the U.S. "settlement authority" regarding NLMK's Section 232 steel and aluminum tariff exclusion case after the parties agreed to a settlement in principle, they said Jan. 2. The Court of International Trade gave the government and NLMK another stay in the case, granting them 30 additional days to file another status report (NLMK Pennsylvania v. United States, CIT # 21-00507).
The Court of International Trade need not be bound by the a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit ruling that said Section 232 duties are "United States import duties" that can be deducted from U.S. price, exporter Nippon Steel Corp. argued in a Dec. 22 reply brief (Nippon Steel Corp. v. United States, CIT # 21-00533).
Turkish duties on a host of U.S. products in retaliation for President Donald Trump's Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs violate World Trade Organization commitments, a WTO dispute panel ruled Dec. 19. The panel said the duties violate articles I and II of the 1994 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and also found that the Section 232 duties are not "safeguards."
The president's authority to modify Section 232 tariffs doesn't allow the president to "transform" tariffs years after setting the duties "by newly restricting wholly distinct categories of derivative goods without any study and without any plausible connection to U.S. national security," exporter Oman Fasteners told the U.S. Supreme Court (Oman Fasteners v. U.S., Sup. Ct. # 23-432).
The Court of International Trade extended the mediation period for a case brought by Evraz challenging the Commerce Department's denial of the importer's Section 232 steel and aluminum tariff exclusion requests. In the Dec. 11 text-only order, the trade court gave the parties until June 30, 2024, to resolve litigation led by Judge Leo Gordon. Evraz called for mediation, along with other litigants, to discuss the availability of a remedy for already liquidated entries (Evraz Inc. v. United States, CIT # 20-03869).
The Court of International Trade on Dec. 1 stayed for 60 days a case on the Commerce Department's refusal to grant Section 232 steel and aluminum tariff exclusions so the parties can conclude the voluntary remand process and "effectuate" Commerce's remand results. The agency changed course last year, granting the exclusions for importer Mirror Metals after finding that the relevant steel article could not be made at a sufficient level in the U.S. (see 2204190016) (Mirror Metals v. United States, CIT # 21-00144).