The Commerce Department's surrogate value picks for inputs of activated carbon violated the law, exporter Jilin Bright Future Chemicals Co. argued in a Jan. 6 complaint at the Court of International Trade. Commerce further erred by deducting VAT amounts from Jilin Bright's export price and in its valuation of the overhead; selling, general and administrative expenses; and profit components of normal value by calculating surrogate financial ratios with data from Tan Meng Keong and Century Chemical Works, the exporter said (Jilin Bright Future Chemicals Co. v. United States, CIT #22-00336).
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Court of International Trade in a Jan. 4 order dismissed a customs case from importer Spartan Tools. The company brought the case looking to recover Section 301 duties it paid on its machinery part imports entered under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheadings 8412.29.8015, 8479.90.9496, 8483.30.8090 and 8483.50.9040, for which the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative granted an exclusion. The case was tossed for lack of prosecution since it was placed in the customs case management calendar and not removed "at the expiration of the applicable period of time of removal," the trade court said (Spartan Tools v. United States, CIT #20-03903).
The Court of International Trade in a Jan. 5 text-only order denied the antidumping petitioner Mid Continent Steel & Wire's motion to extend time to file opposition to plaintiff Oman Fastener's bid for a preliminary injunction against cash deposit requirements. Oman Fasteners on Jan. 4 filed its opposition to the time extension request, telling the trade court that "because the continued existence of Oman Fasteners hangs precariously in the balance, and because the ten-day extension proposed by Mid Continent would compound Oman Fasteners’ substantial ongoing irreparable harm, this is that rare case" requiring the extension bid to be denied (Oman Fasteners v. United States, CIT #22-00348).
The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued its mandate Jan. 4 in a case denying a group of U.S. steel companies the right to intervene in a series of cases challenging denied exclusion requests for Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs. The mandate comes after the court denied the steel companies' rehearing bid over the decision (see 2212280017). In the case, the Court of International Trade and later the Federal Circuit said that a proposed intervenor must have a legally protectable interest in the transaction at issue, have a direct relationship with the litigation where the intervenor will either gain or lose by the direct judgment, or show its interests are not adequately expressed by the government. The courts ruled the steel companies failed on all three fronts.
Surety company Navigators Insurance Co. is seeking over $1.5 million from importer Dehui Solar (US) over the company's failure to reimburse Navigators for customs bond payments for solar panel imports. In a complaint at the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware, the surety said that Dehui Solar violated the terms of their indemnity agreement by failing to pay duties, taxes, fees or other charges related to the import activities (Navigators Insurance Co. v. Dehui Solar Power Inc., D. Del. #22-01605).
Two recent Court of International Trade decisions are relevant to a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit case over whether the Commerce Department properly refused to apply the finished goods exclusion to certain solar panel mounts, plaintiff-appellants China Custom Manufacturing and Greentec Engineering said in a Jan. 3 notice of supplemental authority. The CIT decisions, Columbia Aluminum Products v. U.S. and Worldwide Door Components v. U.S., excluded door threshold assemblies with aluminum extrusions from the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on aluminum extrusions from China as finished merchandise. The appellants said the decisions addressed arguments made in the present appeal (China Custom Manufacturing v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 22-1345).
The Court of International Trade in a Jan. 3 order granted importer WKW North America's stipulation of dismissal with prejudice in its case on the Commerce Department's finished merchandise exemption from antidumping and countervailing duty orders on aluminum extrusions from China (WKW North America v. United States, CIT # 21-00072).
Importer Kyocera Document Solutions America will get refunds on Section 301 duties paid for its printer maintenance kits that were granted a tariff exclusion by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. The importer filed a stipulated judgment at the Court of International Trade on an agreed set of facts, which say that the maintenance kits, liquidated under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 8443.99.2050 and assessed Section 301 tariffs under secondary subheading 9903.88.01, fit under the exclusion.