CBP violated importer Royal Brush Manufacturing's due process rights by failing to provide it access to business confidential information (BCI) in an antidumping and countervailing duty evasion proceeding, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit said in a highly anticipated opinion on July 27.
The U.K. High Court of Justice Administrative Court recently dismissed an application from Russian businessman Sergei Naumenko and companies Dalston Projects and Prism Maritime, legal owners of the Phi superyacht, seeking to regain control of the vessel. The British secretary of state for transport in March 2022 seized the yacht under its Russia sanctions regime.
New Hampshire-based furniture seller Yogibo will pay $217,832 to settle charges it violated the False Claims Act by "failing to pay customs duties on imports from China," the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Massachusetts announced July 26. The case was brought by David Kohlenberger, a whistleblower and former senior logistics and warehouse manager for Yogibo from 2017 to 2021, who will receive 20% of the settlement.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Court of International Trade in a July 26 order granted a stay in two cases challenging the expansion of the Section 232 steel and aluminum duties on derivative products until 30 days after importer PrimeSource Building Products' appeal to the Supreme Court of the U.S. is resolved. PrimeSource indicated it was appealing the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit's ruling upholding the tariff expansion to the Supreme Court earlier this month (see 2307240022). The two cases newly stayed by the trade court were brought by importers J. Conrad and Metropolitan Staple Corp. Judges Jennifer Choe-Groves, M. Miller Baker and Timothy Stanceu said their proceedings will be stayed until PrimeSource's suit "becomes final, including all appeals and remand proceedings" (J. Conrad Ltd v. United States, CIT # 20-00052) (Metropolitan Staple Corp. v. United States, CIT # 20-00053).
The Commerce Department, on remand at the Court of International Trade, incorporated information from antidumping duty respondent Hyundai Heavy Industries Co. regarding its service-related revenues and expenses, slashing the exporter's dumping rate from 16.13% to 4.69%. Commerce solicited this information from the company after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit told the agency to let Hyundai supplement the record (Hitachi Energy USA v. U.S., CIT # 16-00054).
A group of retail trade groups, led by the American Apparel and Footwear Association, said that the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative failed to adequately respond to comments when imposing its lists 3 and 4A Section 301 tariffs on China. Submitting an amicus brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in the massive case against the duties, the retail representatives argued that USTR illegally relied on the president's discretion as a response to the comments, violating the Administrative Procedure Act (HMTX Industries, et al. v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 23-1891).
The Commerce Department improperly used Cohen's d test to root out masked dumping because the agency violated statistical assmptions inherent to the test, SeAH Steel told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in the opening brief of its appeal. While Commerce justified its use of the test because it used a whole population, not a sample, SeAH said the academic literature shows the d test was meant to be used as a measure of effect size only when the data comes from samples with "normal distributions, with roughly equal variance, and a sufficient number of data-points" (Stupp Corp. v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-1663).
The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Commerce Department can use a transaction-specific margin as an adverse facts available rate, the government argued in a July 24 reply brief at the Court of International Trade supporting its motion for reconsideration. While exporter Lumber Liquidators argued that the statute only allows a calculated dumping margin and not one based solely on a single sales transaction, the U.S. said this interpretation cuts against the law's plain language, which says that when Commerce uses AFA, it can use any margin from any segment of the proceeding (Fusong Jinlong Wooden Group Co. v. United States, CIT Consol. # 19-00144).