The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued its mandate in two cases -- one on a Chinese exporter's failure to rebut the presumption of government control in an antidumping case and the other on the Commerce Department's anti-circumvention inquiry against exporter Al Ghurair Iron & Steel. In the AD case, the appellate court said respondent Zhejiang Machinery Import & Export Co. failed to rebut the presumption of Chinese government control in the AD administrative review on tapered roller bearings from China since its majority shareholder is a state-owned labor union (see 2304140025). In the anti-circumvention case, the Federal Circuit said Commerce properly supported its decision that AGIS' goods from the United Arab Emirates circumvented AD/CVD on corrosion-resistant steel products from China by using evidence of patterns of trade, level of investment, nature of the production process in the UAE and the extent of production factilities (see 2304120037) (Zhejiang Machinery Import & Export Corp. v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 21-2257 )(Al Ghurair Iron & Steel v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 22-1199).
The U.S. moved to swap its lead counsel in a countervailing duty case after Bret Vallacher, former head attorney in the suit on the CVD investigation on silicon metal from Kazakhstan, left DOJ. The U.S. said Vallacher "is no longer employed by" the department but was not able to withdraw as principal counsel before leaving. Brendan Jordan was put forward by the government as the next lead counsel. Both appellants, led by Tau-Ken Temir, and defendant-appellees, led by Globe Specialty Metals, consented to the swap (Tau-Ken Temir v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 22-2204).
CBP found an article description for aircraft parts at the 10-digit level in the Harmonized Tariff Schedule begins with "other" and correctly denied a claim for unused substitution drawback, DOJ said in a June 2 cross motion for summary judgment at the Court of International Trade. The case concerns the placement of the word "other" in the superior text between the 8-digit HTS subheading and the 10-digit statistical reporting number. The court's ruling could shake up the industry and could change how CBP interprets what HTS numbers are eligible or not for this type of drawback (see 2303270031) (Spirit Aerosystems v. U.S., CIT # 20-00094).
A recent ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit regarding a statute-of-limitations waiver supports defendant-appellee Katana Racing's arguments in a customs penalty suit, Katana Racing said in a notice of supplemental authority at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. In the present case, the Court of International Trade tossed the government's suit seeking over $5.7 million in unpaid duties on passenger vehicle and light truck tires from China on the grounds that the importer properly revoked its statute of limitations waiver, making the lawsuit untimely due to the expired statute of limitations (see 2203280047) (United States v. Katana Racing, Fed. Cir. # 22-1832).
Plaintiff-appellants Deacero and Deacero USA moved to dismiss their appeal at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit challenging the administrative review of the antidumping duty order on rebar products from Mexico. Both the U.S. and petitioner Rebar Trade Action Coalition consented to the motion. Deacero launched the suit to challenge the Commerce Department's treatment of Section 232 duties paid by Deacero as U.S. import duties, deducting them from the company's U.S. price in the dumping calculation (Deacero S.A.P.I. de C.V. v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 22-1486).
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit should disregard the government's procedural arguments in a case on whether Vandewater International's steel branch outlets fall within the scope of the antidumping duty order on butt-weld pipe fittings from China, importer Smith-Cooper International (SCI) argued in a reply brief (Vandewater International v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-1093).
The Commerce Department correctly continued to find that usage rights at the Port of Incheon granted to Hyundai Steel by the Korean government were countervailable but did not require a less than adequate remuneration (LTAR) analysis, DOJ said alongside defendant-intervenors Nucor, SSAB and Steel Dynamics in separate remand comments submitted to the Court of International Trade on June 1 (Hyundai Steel Company v. U.S., CIT # 21-00536).
The Commerce Department correctly followed a Court of International Trade remand order when it declined to use a mistakenly chosen respondent's individually calculated rate in its calculation of the non-selected respondents rate, instead basing the non-selected rate on the individual rate for a single mandatory respondent, DOJ said in its May 31 remand comments at the Court of International Trade (Jiangsu Senmao Bamboo and Wood Industry v. U.S., CIT # 20-03885).
The Court of International Trade dismissed a customs suit filed by Ivaco Rolling Miss 2004 and Sivaco Wire Group 2004 for lack of prosecution. The case concerned the companies' claims that its steel articles were improperly denied Section 232 steel and aluminum tariff exclusions. The trade court said the case, which was placed on the customs case management calendar, was not removed at the expiration of the "applicable period of time of removal" (Ivaco Rolling Mills 2004 v. U.S., CIT # 21-00234).
Solar cell exporters JA Solar Technology Yangzhou Co., Shanghai JA Solar Technology Co. and JingAo Solar Co. objected to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit's order saying that it will reform the caption to designate the companies as appellees. JA Solar instead asked to remain a plaintiff since it supports appellant Risen Energy even though it did not itself file a notice of appeal. "Second, JA Solar will not be filing or joining any brief in this proceeding, nor does it intend to participate in oral argument," the brief said. The suit is challenging the Commerce Department's surrogate values for silver paste and use partial neutral facts available in the 2017-18 administrative review of the antidumping duty order on solar cells from China (see 2301050026) (Risen Energy Co. v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 23-1550).