Mediation was unsuccessful in a case from U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit Judge Pauline Newman against three of her colleagues' investigation into the judge's fitness to continue serving on the court. Per a joint status report submitted to the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, the parties are looking to continue briefing on Newman's motion for a preliminary injunction against the Federal Circuit Judicial Council's order barring Newman from receiving new cases (Hon. Pauline Newman v. Hon. Kimberly Moore, D.D.C. # 23-01334).
The Commerce Department failed to consider the "reliance interests" of antidumping petitioners led by Bonney Forge Co. when sticking by its decision to find that questionnaires issued in lieu of on-site verification satisfied the statute's requirement for verification, the Court of International Trade ruled on Aug. 21. Judge Stephen Vaden said that while past practice "is not an inescapable straitjacket," an agency must put a "reasoned explanation on the record" in compliance with the rules established by the Supreme Court in Department of Homeland Security v. Regents of the University of California.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The U.S. urged the Court of International Trade to uphold the Commerce Department's remand results in which it found that Vietnam Finewood Co.'s hardwood plywood made using two-ply panels imported to Vietnam from China is not subject to the scope of the AD/CVD orders on hardwood plywood from China. Submitting remand comments to the court, the agency said that since no party contests the remand results, the court should uphold them (Far East American v. United States, CIT Consol. # 22-00049).
The Commerce Department legally used antidumping duty respondent Dillinger France's normal books and records as facts otherwise available by reallocating production costs between prime and non-prime plate in the AD investigation on carbon and alloy steel cut-to-length plate from France, the Court of International Trade ruled in an Aug. 15 opinion.
Colombian conglomerate Grupo Aval and its subsidiary Corporacion Financiera Colombiana (Corficolombiana) will pay more than $60 million to settle allegations that the firms violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the SEC and DOJ announced last week. The government alleged Corficolombiana bribed Colombian government officials to win a contract for a 328-mile highway infrastructure project in the South American nation.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The U.S. asked for another 60 days to file its reply brief in the massive Section 301 litigation at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The government said the present suit is a test case for over 4,100 similar cases and an extension would allow DOJ more time to confer with all the federal agencies involved in the case (HMTX Industries v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 23-1891).
Conservation groups Sierra Club and the Center for Biological Diversity took to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to ask the Department of Energy to reverse its approval of exports to be shipped from the Alaska liquefied natural gas project. The decision, which approves LNG shipments from Alaska's North Slope to Asia, failed to fully assess the project's "climate and environmental harms," the center said in a press release.
Hong Kong-based apparel company Chagji Esquel Textile (CJE) and the Commerce Department filed a joint stipulation of dismissal on Aug. 11 in CJE's suit challenging its placement on the Entity List. The parties most recently filed a joint status report in June as they discussed the conditions related to the End-User Review Committee's July 2021 decision to drop the company from the Entity List (Changji Esquel Textile Co. v. Gina M. Raimondo, D.D.C. # 21-01798).