The Commerce Department legally found that financial statements submitted by antidumping duty petitioners from Indian mattress maker Emirates Sleep were publicly available, the petitioners, led by Brooklyn Bedding, argued in comments backing Commerce's remand results at the Court of International Trade. While the trade court found that the agency did not adequately explain whether the statements were publicly available, Commerce properly explained on remand that they were via the Indian government's Ministry of Corporate Affairs and Zauba Corp., a web service that takes information on Indian businesses that is all a matter of public record, Brooklyn Bedding said (Ashley Furniture Industries v. United States, CIT # 21-00283).
The Commerce Department erred in its selection of surrogate values and data sets in an antidumping duty investigation on mobile access equipment and subassemblies from China, the Coalition of American Manufacturers of Mobile Access Equipment said in a reply brief filed April 25 at the Court of International Trade. The court should remand the final determination in the AD investigation to Commerce, the coalition argued (Coalition of American Manufacturers of Mobile Access Equipment v. U.S., CIT # 22-00152).
The Enforce and Protect Act case involving Aspects Furniture International is not one of a lack of cooperation, "but instead one of 'too much' cooperation for CBP to handle, so much so that CBP chose to abuse its discretion" in ignoring the record completely, Aspects told the Court of International Trade. Submitting opposing comments on CBP's remand results, the bedroom furniture importer said CBP made "general, conclusory" explanations of its evasion decision based on the fact that it saw employees of Aspects' Chinese satellite office, Aspects Nantong, destroying information (Aspects Furniture International v. United States, CIT # 20-03824).
The Court of International Trade in a pair of opinions upheld the Commerce Department's final results in the first administrative review of the antidumping duty order on large diameter welded pipe from Greece and in the 2019 administrative review of the countervailing duty order on carbon and alloy steel cut-to-length plate from South Korea.
CBP's Office of Regulations and Rulings abused its discretion when it overturned a determination of evasion in an administrative review, the Aluminum Extrusions Fair Trade Committee (AEFTC) said in an April 26 motion for judgment at the Court of International Trade. The original determination found that Kingtom Aluminio SRL had evaded antidumping and countervailing duty orders on aluminum extrusions from China by transshipment through the Dominican Republic. The AEFTC asked the court to remand the case to CBP (Aluminum Extrusions Fair Trade Committee v. U.S., CIT # 22-00236).
The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Commerce Department reasonably declined to investigate alleged off-peak sales of electricity and correctly decided not to treat an affiliate as a cross-owned input supplier in a countervailing duty investigation on carbon and alloy steel cut-to-length plate from South Korea, DOJ argued April 24 at the Court of International Trade (Nucor v. U.S., CIT # 21-00182).
Commerce's adjustment to the total manufacturing cost and scrap offsets in an antidumping duty administrative review on steel pipes and tubes from Korea cannot be argued at the Court of International Trade, defendant-intervenor Nucor Tubular Products said in an April 24 motion to dismiss two claims in HiSteel's complaint. Nucor argued that even if HiSteel is correct, the alleged calculation errors could not have affected the dumping margin, and so HiSteel has failed to allege any actual injury and the claims are not subject to the court's jurisdiction (HiSteel Co. v. U.S., CIT # 22-00142).
The Commerce Department did not adequately explain its finding that ship building company Nur Gemicilik ve Tic, an affiliate of countervailing duty respondent Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret, was a cross-owned input supplier of primarily dedicated inputs, the Court of International Trade ruled. Sending back the 2018 administrative review of the CVD order on rebar from Turkey, Judge Gary Katzmann said Commerce erroneously relied on prior segments of the review and a past CIT decision to say that "scrap" is an input primarily dedicated to the production of downstream steel products.
The Commerce Department and the International Trade Commission published the following Federal Register notices April 26 on AD/CVD proceedings: