The Court of International Trade ruled once again Sept. 27 that the Commerce Department cannot make a particular market situation adjustment to the cost of production for the sales-below-cost test when calculating normal value. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves remanded the case to Commerce, finding that nothing in the statute permits such an adjustment.
The Commerce Department's calculation of the separate rate in an antidumping duty review by averaging the separate rates from the previous four administrative reviews was backed by substantial evidence, the Court of International Trade said in a Sept. 27 order. After previously finding that Commerce's extension of the adverse facts available rate to the non-individually examined respondents was unlawful, the court then upheld the agency's new separate rate calculation methodology.
The Commerce Department's decision to pick Mexico over Malaysia as a surrogate country in an antidumping duty investigation on Chinese quartz surface products was properly supported, the Court of International Trade said in a Sept. 24 opinion. Judge Leo Gordon upheld the determination, finding that the plaintiff, mandatory respondent Foshan Yixin Stone Company Limited, needed to prove that Malaysia was "the one and only reasonable surrogate country selection" -- something it failed to do.
The International Trade Commission had no authority to deny lawyers representing LG Electronics access to confidential business information during a safeguard proceeding on solar cells from China, the lawyers argued in a Sept. 24 brief at the Court of International Trade. The congressional mandate for granting administrative protective orders (APOs) merely tells the ITC what it "shall" do, so commission had no grounds to deny a timely filed APO application, the Curtis Mallet-Prevost lawyers said (LG Electronics USA, Inc., et al. v. United States, CIT 21-00520).
The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's final results in an investigation into circumvention of the antidumping and countervailing duties on corrosion-resistant steel products from the China, in a Sept. 24 confidential order. The case was brought by Al Ghurair Iron & Steel, which was found to be circumventing the AD/CVD orders via the United Arab Emirates. In a letter to the litigants, Judge Timothy Reif requested that the parties review the opinion by Oct. 1 for any confidential information to be redacted (Al Ghurair Iron & Steel LLC v. United States, CIT #21-00142).
The Court of International Trade in a Sept. 24 order remanded for the fourth time the Commerce Department's attempt to set the all-others rate in an antidumping duty investigation by averaging a zero percent and an adverse facts available rate given to the two mandatory respondents. The court said Commerce has an obligation to assign dumping margins as accurately as possible, which it said the agency was not doing when it came up with the all-others rate without using any company's actual data.
Commerce to Consider Separate Rate Status for Pirelli Before Being Bought by Chinese Firm, CIT Rules
The Commerce Department's denial of separate rate status to Pirelli Tyre Co. during the first 10 months of the review period in an antidumping duty administrative review was improper because the importer was not yet owned by a Chinese government-associated entity during that time frame, the Court of International Trade said in a Sept. 24 order. Remanding in part and sustaining in part Commerce's second remand results in the AD duty review of passenger vehicle and light truck tires from China, Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves also sustained Commerce's decision, under protest, to drop the downward adjustment for irrecoverable value-added tax to mandatory respondent Qingdao Sentury Tire Co.'s export price.
The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's remand results in the 13th administrative review of the antidumping duty order on fish fillets from Vietnam in a Sept. 27 order. In the review, Commerce applied total adverse facts available to the mandatory respondents, leading to a $3.87/kg dumping margin which the court upheld in a previous decision. Commerce also extended this rate to the non-individually reviewed "separate rate" respondents, which the court remanded. Under protest, Commerce set the separate rate by averaging the separate rates from the previous four administrative reviews, which the court ultimately sustained.
Rimco, a steel importer, challenged the antidumping and countervailing duties assessed on its steel wheel imports from China as being excessive fines in violation of the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, in a Sept. 22 complaint at the Court of International Trade. Rimco said that the extremely high and excessive AD/CVD rates were not remedial but in fact penal in nature, leading to the deprivation of property when CBP imposed the AD/CV duties (Rimco, Inc. v. United States, CIT #21-00537).
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade: