Tomato exporters Bioparques de Occidente and Agricola La Primavera and wholesaler Kaliroy Fresh will appeal a May Court of International Trade opinion that affirmed the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit's dismissal of one count of its case challenging the Commerce Department's decision to resume an antidumping duty investigation following the termination of a suspension agreement. The claim concerned Commerce's withdrawal from a previous suspension agreement and claimed jurisdiction under Section 1581(i). While the trade court said it had jurisdiction to hear the claim, the appellate court already dismissed the challenge on substantive grounds (see 2305010071). Per the notice of appeal, the companies will take the case back to the Federal Circuit (Bioparques de Occidente, et al. v. United States, CIT # 20-00035).
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in a June 30 order accepted the amended opening brief and addendum filed by Kazakh exporter Tau-Ken Temir in a case on the Commerce Department's use of adverse facts available due to missed filing deadlines in an antidumping duty review. In submitting its amended brief, TKT submitted a version of its original opening brief with corrections sought by the clerk of the court and also a version with these corrections plus corrections additionally requested by the exporter. The appellate court accepted only the first form of these submissions (Tau-Ken Temir v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 22-2204).
CBP did not misapply the substantial evidence standard in finding that importers American Pacific Plywood, U.S. Global Forest and InterGlobal Forest evaded the antidumping and countervailing duties on hardwood plywood products from China, the Court of International Trade ruled in a June 22 opinion made public June 30.
A World Trade Organization dispute panel suspended its consideration of Russia's complaint against U.S. antidumping duties on steel and aluminum products at Russia's request, the WTO announced. The panel said that after reviewing Russia's comments and U.S. opposition, it decided to temporarily stop its work on the dispute. Per WTO rules, the panel cannot halt the work for more than 12 months.
The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Court of International Trade recently granted DOJ’s motion for more time to file its remand results in a case on CBP's Enforce and Protect Act determination that Fedmet Resources evaded the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on magnesia alumina carbon bricks from China. Fedmet opposed the motion, which sought a 60-day extension of the July 3 due date, because it would perpetuate the "continuing prejudice" suffered by the importer due to the "unjustified imposition of interim measures against Fedmet," which has effectively stopped it from importing MAC bricks since May 2020. The court granted the extension motion in a text-only order, giving the government until Sept. 1 to file the remand results. It said no further extensions would be granted unless a showing of extraordinary circumstances is made (Fedmet Resources v. U.S., CIT # 21-00248).
The Tariff Act of 1930 does not provide the exclusive means for recovering evaded antidumping duties, the Anti-Fraud Coalition said in a June 26 amicus brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. The False Claims Act stands as a "complementary enforcement mechanism" used when an importer defrauds the U.S. by filing false customs forms to evade duties, the brief said. The coalition filed its brief in an FCA suit on whether Sigma Corp., along with other companies, evaded antidumping duties on welded couplets from China by submitting false customs information (Island Industries v. Sigma Corp., 9th Cir. # 22-55063).
The Court of International Trade granted U.S. steel company Nucor Corp.'s bid to dismiss its suit on the 2020 administrative review of the countervailing duty order on corrosion-resistant steel products from South Korea. Nucor launched the suit to contest the Commerce Department's finding that electricity in South Korea that was provided for less than adequate remuneration conferred no benefit (see 2304070054). Nucor claimed that the agency was required to verify questionnaire responses from the South Korean government regarding the provision of the electricity (Nucor Corp. v. United States, CIT # 23-00058).
Chinese exporter Carbon Activated Tianjin Co. and its U.S. importer Carbon Activated Corp. will appeal a Court of International Trade decision upholding the Commerce Department's surrogate value picks for coal-based carbonized materials and financial statement selections used to calculate surrogate ratios. The companies are challenging an antidumping duty administrative review on activated carbon from China, the June 27 notice of appeal said. CIT Judge Mark Barnett ruled that Commerce's pick of Malaysian data for Harmonized System subheading 4402.90.1000 to value carbonized material was backed by substantial evidence, as was the agency's selection of the 2018 Bravo Green financial statements (see 2305010006) (Carbon Activated Tianjin Co. v. U.S., CIT # 21-00131).
The government incorrectly claimed that there are two separate jurisdictional paths for contesting Enforce and Protect Act decisions, appellants Ascension Chemicals, UMD Solutions, Crude Chem Technology and Glob Energy Corp. argued in a reply brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (All One God Faith v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-1078).