The Court of International Trade doesn’t have jurisdiction to hear a case involving a textile company’s dispute with CBP, saying the company sought relief under the wrong statute, Judge Timothy Stanceu held in a March 10 opinion. The trade court found Printing Textiles, doing business as Berger Textiles, didn’t show why the denied protest challenge should be filed under Section 1581(i), the court's "residual" jurisdiction, and not Section 1581(a). Berger filed a notice of appeal the next business day.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
Chemical Products Corp. has dropped a suit challenging the Commerce Department's final negative determination of dumping in the antidumping duty investigation on barium chloride from India at the Court of International Trade (Chemical Products Corp. v. United States, CIT, # 23-00021). The case was brought in February and saw little action until CPC requested dismissal March 9. CPC did not respond to requests for comment. DOJ declined to comment on the dismissal.
The Court of International Trade should affirm the Commerce Department's remand results in order to allow a countervailing duty petitioner to potentially appeal aspects of those results to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, petitioner Daikin America said in its March 9 remand comments to the Court of International Trade (Gujarat Fluorochemicals Ltd. v. United States, CIT # 22-00120).
The Commerce Department's subsidy calculation errors in a countervailing duty review on multilayered wood flooring from China resulted in an inaccurate CVD rate for Fine Furniture and other Chinese wood flooring exporters, Fine Furniture argued in a March 9 motion for judgment af the Court of International Trade (Baroque Timber Industries (Zhongshan) Co. v. United States, CIT # 22-00210).
Dismissing Sea Shepherd New Zealand's and Sea Shepherd Conservation Society's challenge of an expired comparability finding for New Zealand's West Coast North Island multispecies set-net and trawl fisheries would allow the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to evade review and take similar action in the future, the conservation groups said in a March 9 brief (Sea Shepherd New Zealand v. U.S., CIT # 20-00112).
The Commerce Department properly found that a type of aluminum sheet imported from Turkey by AA Metals was covered by the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on common alloy aluminum sheet from China, the Court of International Trade ruled in a March 10 opinion.
The Court of International Trade issued a pair of opinions on March 10. In one, brought by Printing Textiles, Judge Timothy Stanceu dismissed the customs action for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. The company filed the case under Section 1581(i), the court's "residual" jurisdiction, challenging CBP's denial of its protests on its Canvas Banner Matisse coated fabric. Printing Textiles said that the entries weren't subject to the antidumping order and that the Commerce Department had initiated a scope request on the company's imports. Stanceu said jurisdiction could have been available under Section 1581(a) or Section 1581(c) should Commerce find the imports to be in the scope of the order.
The Court of International Trade ruled March 13 that CBP properly classified as steel tubing, not insulating fittings, the carbon steel tubing lined with epoxy coating imported by Shamrock Building Materials. Judge Timothy Stanceu said the "uncontested facts show" that the subject merchandise is not, as Shamrock claimed, insulating material under the Harmonized Tariff Schedule heading 8547 per the meaning of that term as used in the heading's description.
Judge Stephen Vaden of the Court of International Trade said he did not understand why CIT cases involving presidential decisions or constitutional claims are not allowed direct appeals to the Supreme Court. Speaking March 8 on the "Original Jurisdiction" podcast, Vaden detailed the way constitutional claims are heard at CIT and explained how they are different from other federal courts.