Solar modules made from unfinished solar cells imported from China into Vietnam for finishing are likely subject to antidumping and countervailing duties on crystalline silicon photovoltaic cells, whether or not assembled into modules, from China (A-570-979/C-570-980), the Commerce Department said in a preliminary scope ruling issued March 30. The country where the p/n junction is formed on the cells determines country of origin, which in the case of these cells is China, Commerce said.

A wide range of companies and trade groups told the Commerce Department that the semiconductor supply is vulnerable because of over-concentration in Taiwan, China and Japan in particular, and because packaging and testing is becoming more concentrated in China. Comments in docket BIS-2021-0011 closed April 5, but some comments were not published until April 6. The comments were sought to flesh out policy to follow an executive order on the semiconductor shortage (see 2103110048).

International Trade Today is providing readers with the top stories from March 29-April 2 in case they were missed. All articles can be found by searching on the titles or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.

The assembly of lithium-ion battery packs in China prior to import doesn't result in a substantial transformation, CBP said in an April 1 ruling. Greenworks Tools sought a country of origin ruling on the battery packs, which are used with power tools. The company argued that the origin should be based on the origin of the battery cells and CBP agreed.

The Court of International Trade found that President Donald Trump violated procedural time limits when expanding Section 232 tariffs to steel and aluminum “derivatives,” in an April 5 decision granting refunds to steel nail importer PrimeSource Building Products. Judges Timothy Stanceu and Jennifer Choe-Groves, as part of a three-judge panel, struck down the tariff expansion, ruling that the president exceeded his authority to impose tariffs when he elected to extend them to derivative products. Judge M. Miller Baker, the remaining judge on the panel, dissented from the opinion.

Imported flooring with a natural cork veneer on top should be classified based on that veneer, CBP said in a March 4 ruling. The law firm Neville Peterson requested the CBP internal advice ruling on behalf of the importer, Toryls, it said. The company said the flooring should be classified based on the layer of agglomerated cork included in the flooring.

The Generalized System of Preferences benefits program and the Miscellaneous Tariff Bill are unlikely to get a vote in the House for months, as an infrastructure bill and the taxes to pay for those projects is shaped by committees, a top lawmaker said during a press call April 1. The top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee said that while “all the oxygen is being sucked up” by the infrastructure bill, “my sense of Chairman [Richard] Neal is that he, too, believes they are crucial to America's economic leadership and wants to find consensus on how to end the delay on both of the programs.”

Several CBP land border ports are now operating “downtime procedures” due to problems in ACE, an agency official said April 1 during a call with software developers. The affected ports include Laredo and El Paso in Texas, he said. “We are seeing significant disruptions at the land border ports at this time,” he said.

The three-judge panel in the Section 301 litigation inundating the U.S. Court of International Trade granted Akin Gump’s coordinated proposal designating the first-filed HMTX Industries-Jasco Products complaint as the sole sample case, a procedural order said March 31. Judges also stayed the roughly 3,700 other cases and approved the seating of a 15-member plaintiffs steering committee, also as Akin Gump proposed.

As the U.S. Fashion Industry Association's representatives in Washington try to find out timing for a renewal of the Generalized System of Preferences benefits program, Senate Finance Committee staff members are telling them “there’s a lack of urgency with respect to this” among senators. David Spooner, Washington counsel for USFIA, told an online audience March 30 that Congress seems to think that since importers will get refunds for goods that should have qualified for GSP during this period once it's renewed, it's no big deal. “But we know what a pain in the rear the retroactive renewals are,” he said.