Importer Composite Technology International filed a trio of complaints at the Court of International Trade on Oct. 20 challenging CBP's tariff classification of its wooden stile and rail imports. When it denied Composite's protests, CBP pointed to a prior CIT ruling holding that the wooden stiles and rails fall under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 4421.90.97, but Composite argues for classification under subheading 4412.99.51 (Composite Technology International, Inc. v. United States, CIT #17-00175, #17-00129, #17-00178).
Turkish steel exporter Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret kicked off litigation at the Court of International Trade in an Oct. 19 complaint over a countervailing duty review on steel concrete reinforcing bar from Turkey covering entries in 2018, arguing against the Commerce Department's finding that ship building company Nur Gemicilik ve Tic is a cross-owned input supplier of Kaptan (Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret A.S. v. United States, CIT #21-00565).
The Commerce Department dropped its reliance on facts otherwise available in a countervailing duty review related to a South Korean port usage rights program, in Oct. 20 remand results submitted to the Court of International Trade. Having filed for a voluntary remand at CIT to tackle what it identified as its own mistakes in relying on facts otherwise available, Commerce found it no longer needed to apply facts available after receiving additional information from the relvant exporter (Hyundai Steel Company v. United States, CIT #20-03799).
No lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade.
Consolidated plaintiff M S International will appeal an Oct. 7 Court of International Trade decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, according to an Oct. 18 notice of appeal. CIT ruled that the Commerce Department had enough industry support to kick off antidumping and countervailing duty investigations into quartz surface products from India (see 2110080035). The trade court held that Commerce has the right to define domestic “producers” of the subject merchandise for the purposes of finding out if enough industry support exists to launch the investigations. Judge Leo Gordon cited Federal Circuit precedent that Commerce is afforded Chevron deference in how it finds which companies are considered “producers” (Pokarna Engineered Stone Ltd., et al. v. United States, CIT #20-00127).
The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's remand results in an antidumping duty review dropping a cost-based particular market situation adjustment to the sales-below-cost test, in an Oct. 19 order. Commerce dropped the PMS adjustment after the court previously found that the law does not permit such an adjustment for the purposes of calculating normal value (see 2106220064).
The Court of International Trade ruled in an Oct. 18 opinion that the U.S. must respond to 25 of importer Greenlight Organic's requests for admissions in a customs fraud case. Having filed 116 of them, Greenlight, along with exporter Parambir Singh Aulakh, then moved to compel the U.S. to respond, hoping that they would narrow the scope of the fraud case and expedite the process. The court agreed with the U.S.'s objections to many of the RFAs, but ultimately granted the move to compel the U.S. to answer the remaining 25.
The Commerce Department denied two Section 232 steel and aluminum tariff exclusion requests after completing a voluntary remand to reconsider its decision to initially reject the exclusion bids. Submitting the denials on Oct. 18 in remand results at the Court of International Trade, Commerce cited the International Trade Administration's analysis of the situation, which found that the domestic industry had enough capacity to take over for the subject imports (Maple Leaf Marketing, Inc. v. U.S., CIT #20-00125).
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
Consolidated plaintiff, defendant-intervenor and Canadian lumber company Fontaine will appeal an August Court of International Trade opinion to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, it said in an Oct. 15 notice of appeal. The decision vacated a Commerce Department regulation establishing expedited reviews for countervailing duty investigations (see 2108190002). Following four opinions from CIT, the trade court eventually found that it could not find any statutory basis for the regulations. Another consolidated plaintiff and defendant-intervenor, Mobilier Rustique (Beauce) Inc., has appealed the decision (Committee Overseeing Action for Lumber International Trade Investigations or Negotiations, et al. v. United States, CIT Consol. #19-00122).