Commerce Terminates Glass Bottle AD Investigation at 'Unprecedented' Request of Petitioner

In a Dec. 30 Federal Register notice, the agency said it granted the U.S. Glass Producers Coalition's request despite opposition by respondents to a concurrent investigation on Mexico. Commerce found that the request satisfied the need for the termination of the investigation to be in the public interest and instructed CBP to terminate suspension of liquidation and refund the cash deposits of estimated antidumping duties for entries of glass wine bottles from Chile.

The U.S. Glass Producers Coalition -- Ardagh Glass and the United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union -- originally requested the imposition of antidumping and countervailing duties on Chile, Mexico and China in December 2023, but requested termination Dec. 10, nearly two years later (see 2401030043). The petitioner didn't withdraw its request for AD on glass bottles from Mexico and China, and Commerce issued an affirmative final determination for those countries on Dec. 26 (see 2412260038).

The coalition acknowledged that the request was an “extraordinary event in the course of this investigation,” but cited “the Commission’s decision earlier this year to deny relief from subsidized imports of subject merchandise from China” as the reason for the request.

In response to the petitioner’s request, four Mexican glassmaking companies filed a rebuttal, saying the “petitioner confesses outright that it seeks to terminate the Chile AD investigation because it is not satisfied with the Commission's final injury determination, and therefore hopes to manipulate the data for the final injury determinations in the AD investigations for China and Mexico.”

In its CVD investigation, the International Trade Commission made a negative determination for China and the petitioner seemed to be worried for the same result in the AD case. It's not clear from the data available what impact the removal of the Chile AD case will have on the remaining investigations, but lawyer Alexander Keyser, who represents Mexican glassmaker Encore Glass, theorized that the petitioners "seem to believe that deleting Chile from the case somehow helps them in Mexico and China AD."

The companies also questioned the legal basis for the withdrawal, which requires that the termination be in the public interest. Keyser went on to say that far from serving the public interest, the withdrawal of the investigation “causes great expense for the parties involved and for the petitioner to change the facts it may mean that we have to go back to the drawing board and this may incur additional expense and time for the parties involved and the government.”

The petitioner responded that the Mexican exporters’ arguments were erroneous because the Commerce Department “terminates an investigation upon request of a petitioner and deems such a termination to be in the public interest when the petitioner so requests.”

Ultimately, the Commerce Department found the petitioner’s argument compelling as it concluded the termination of the investigation to be in the public interest, but it didn't acknowledge the arguments of the interested parties.

With the Commerce Department’s final affirmative determination released on Dec. 23, the ITC has until Feb. 6 to make its final determination. While “fully expecting a negative decision,” lawyers representing the Mexican exporters said that they will challenge Commerce’s decision to withdraw the Chile AD case, “if the ITC goes negative.”

“We continue to believe whether Chile is in or out that the facts before the ITC support a negative determination for China and Mexico,” lawyer Lisbeth Levinson said. "We do think that the petitioner is trying to game the system. This action is unprecedented, and we do not think the government should allow that."