The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Court of International Trade in an Oct. 12 confidential opinion remanded the Commerce Department's final determination in the countervailing duty investigation on forged steel fluid end blocks from Germany. In a text-only order, Judge Claire Kelly ordered Commerce to reconsider its position that the KAV program -- a concession fee ordinance program for public transport routes -- is a specific subsidy, and its rate calculations for the Electricity Tax Act and the Energy Tax Act. Kelly, in a letter to litigants, gave parties to the case until Oct. 19 to review the confidential information in the opinion (BGH Edelstahl Siegen v. United States, CIT #21-00080).
The Court of International Trade in an Oct. 5 opinion made public Oct. 12 upheld parts and sent back parts of the Commerce Department's final results in the 2018 administrative review of the countervailing duty order on carbon and alloy steel cut-to-length plate from South Korea. Judge Mark Barnett held that Commerce must reconsider or further explain its decision not to investigate off-peak electricity sold for less than adequate remuneration and its decision not to treat respondent POSCO's affiliate POSCO Plantec as a cross-owned input supplier for the supply of scrap.
Judge Stephen Vaden never sought his nomination to the Court of International Trade. Rather, during a trip to San Francisco while serving as general counsel to USDA, he got an intriguing phone call. Using his deductive powers, Vaden knew the call could only have originated from one place: 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Walking on the streets of San Francisco, he waited until he could slip back into his hotel to take the call, because who takes a call from the White House on the street?
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
US Reply Makes It 'Crystal Clear' That Commerce Illegally Denied Section 232 Exclusions, NLMK Argues
The U.S. made it "crystal clear" that "no decision-maker could have reasonably" found that the U.S. industry made certain steel slabs in enough quantity to warrant rejecting steel company NLMK Pennsylvania's requests for Section 232 tariff exclusions, NLMK argued in a reply brief at the Court of International Trade. DOJ argued that the Commerce Department's regulations on quality criterion exclude the consideration of slab size when determining if there's enough capacity to make the merchandise in question in the U.S. NLMK said that argument contradicts the language of the regulation itself and is "nonsense on its face" (NLMK Pennsylvania v. United States, CIT #21-00507).
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Commerce Department cannot countervail glass purchases since both the Court of International Trade and Commerce have found that glass subsidies are not aluminum extrusions inputs, countervailing duty review respondent Guangzhou Jangho Curtain Wall System Engineering Co. argued in its Oct. 3 opening brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Jangho also argued that CIT illegally allowed Commerce to make a post hoc rationalization as a basis for the finding to countervail glass subsidies (Taizhou United Imp. & Exp. Co. v. United States, Fed. Cir. 22-2000).
CBP illegally collected duties on bifacial solar panels after the Court of International Trade struck down the Trump administration's revocation of a tariff exclusion on bifacial solar panels, importer Canadian Solar (USA) argued in a complaint at CIT. Given that the trade court found the tariff revocation illegal, CBP no longer can require the importers to pay the safeguard tariff on bifacial solar panels, the brief said. The duties "are substantial and impose a continuing financial burden," Canadian Solar argued (Canadian Solar (USA) Inc. v. United States, CIT #22-00295).
The Commerce Department in Oct. 7 remand results submitted to the Court of International Trade dropped its use of adverse facts available pertaining to the use of China's Export Buyer's Credit Program for one respondent in a countervailing duty review but not the other mandatory respondent. Commerce found that JA Solar Co., provided enough data to fill gaps left by the Chinese government's failure to provide certain information to prove that its U.S. customers did not benefit from the EBCP while Risen Energy Co. did not (Risen Energy Co. v. United States, CIT #20-03912).