The Commerce Department's decision to assume 24 working days per month for calculating surrogate labor rates, instead of 21 days, in an antidumping administrative review is unsupported, the Coalition for Fair Trade in Hardwood Plywood said in a June 24 motion for judgment in the Court of International Trade. The coalition said the agency failed to properly explain its switch to 24 working days after originally relying on 21 days in its preliminary determination (Coalition for Fair Trade in Hardwood Plywood v. United States, CIT #20-03930).
Many cases challenging findings of antidumping or countervailing duty evasion under the Enforce and Protect Act include claims that the process has violated an importer's constitutional rights, particularly under the Fifth Amendment. Case after case in the Court of International Trade argues elements of the EAPA process -- from the lack of notice provided to an importer that it's under investigation to the insufficient public summaries of proprietary information in the investigation -- violate importers' due process rights under the U.S. Constitution. However, the circumstances under which these claims may actually be heard by CIT may have yet to come, trade lawyers said.
The Commerce Department and the International Trade Commission published the following Federal Register notices July 2 on AD/CV duty proceedings:
CBP asked the Commerce Department to say whether aluminum sheet from China produced according to two scenarios is subject to antidumping and countervailing duty orders. The May 13 notice was posted June 24. The request is part of a CBP Enforce and Protect Act investigation into whether AA Metals evaded AD/CV duties. Specifically, CBP would like Commerce to determine whether “Chinese-origin aluminum sheet of a thickness a little greater than covered by the scope re-rolled in Turkey to a thickness covered by the scope” and “Chinese-origin aluminum sheet of a thickness covered by the scope re-rolled in Turkey to a thickness covered by the scope” should be subject to the orders.
The Commerce Department continued to use Malaysia as its primary surrogate country in an antidumping administrative review after the Court of International Trade told the agency to further explain the departure from using Romania, Commerce said in June 30 remand results. The agency did, however, grant that Romania classifies as a "significant producer" of activated carbon, the subject merchandise, a departure from its final results. The agency also switched to using Malaysian surrogate values for a key input in activated carbon for most of the mandatory respondents' suppliers.
A particular market situation will no longer be part of the dumping margin calculation for oil country tubular goods from Korea after the Commerce Department submitted its remand results to the Court of International Trade on June 30. Commerce dropped the PMS finding after the court said that there was not enough evidence to support the agency's finding that the Korean steel market was heavily subsidized (SeAH Steel Co. v. United States, CIT #19-00086).
The Commerce Department and the International Trade Commission published the following Federal Register notices June 30 - July 1 on AD/CV duty proceedings:
The Commerce Department's decision to swap the basis for its total adverse facts available determination in an antidumping administrative review is backed by substantial evidence and in line with Court of International Trade remand orders, the Department of Justice said in June 30 comments on the remand results. After Judge M. Miller Baker found that Commerce improperly relied on two issues with plaintiff Hung Vuong Group's data submitted to the agency to determine AFA, Commerce flipped to two other elements of HVG's data to make the same determination (Hung Vuong Corporation, et al. v. United States, CIT #19-00055).
CBP asked the Commerce Department to weigh in on whether steel wheels from China alleged to have evaded antidumping and countervailing duties fall within the scope of the orders, CBP said in a notice posted June 28. The request is part of a CBP Enforce and Protect Act investigation into whether Vanguard National Trailer used transshipment through Thailand to evade the duties. “CBP is unable to determine whether the steel wheels exported from Thailand by Asia Wheel Co. Ltd. (Asia Wheel), which are produced from imported rectangular steel plates from China and a third country that Asia Wheel converts into rims in Thailand and welds with Chinese-origin discs in Thailand, are covered merchandise subject to the AD and CVD orders,” the agency said.
The Department of Justice invoked a recent U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit opinion in an antidumping case involving a country-wide rate for a non-market economy, according to a June 28 notice of supplemental authority in the Court of International Trade. In the case, the China Manufacturers Alliance and Shanghai Huayi Group Corporation said that Commerce determined a country-wide antidumping rate without providing the legal basis for doing so in an antidumping investigation of truck and bus tires from China (Guizhou Tyre Co., Ltd. et al. v. United States, CIT #19-00031). But in China Manufacturers Alliance, LLC v. United States, decided on June 10, the Federal Circuit said that Commerce can assign a China-wide rate “by the very means in which Commerce did in this investigation,” DOJ said. The decision showed that Commerce's China-wide rate is an individually investigated rate (see 2106100044).