In the wake of Loper Bright, the U.S. and two defendant-intervenors raised three different sets of arguments July 25 in defense of the Commerce Department’s interpretation of the statute governing sunset reviews. All three opposed a plaintiff softwood lumber exporter’s claim that its case had been substantially strengthened by the demise of the Chevron doctrine (Resolute FP Canada v. U.S., CIT # 23-00095).
The Court of International Trade in a July 17 decision made public July 25 sent back the Commerce Department's use of exporter Prochamp's German sales as the comparison market in an antidumping duty investigation. Judge M. Miller Baker said that since the agency didn't know what percentage of the company's German sales were actually for consumption in Germany, Commerce's use of the comparison market was unsupported.
The Court of International Trade on July 29 sustained the Commerce Department's 2019-20 review of the antidumping duty order on xanthan gum from China. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves said on remand that Commerce properly slashed exporter Meihua Group International Trading (Hong Kong) Limited's AD margin to zero percent from a 154.07% adverse facts available rate. The judge also sustained the agency's collapsing analysis, which said Deosen Biochemical shouldn't be collapsed with Deosen Biochemcial (Ordos) since Deosen Biochemical made no shipments during the review period. As a result, Deosen Biochemical's review under the AD order was rescinded.
The Court of International Trade on July 26 remanded the Commerce Department's 2020-21 review of the antidumping duty order on circular welded carbon-quality steel pipe from the United Arab Emirates. After finding that exporters led by respondent Universal Tube and Plastic Industries didn't fail to exhaust their administrative remedies regarding arguments on Commerce's consideration of alternative time periods in the Cohen's d test, Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves remanded the agency's consideration of the time periods in the d test, which is used to detect "masked" dumping.
The Commerce Department and the International Trade Commission published the following Federal Register notices July 26 on AD/CVD proceedings:
The Commerce Department improperly used an invoice date as the date of sale of goods in the 2021-22 review of the antidumping duty order on steel concrete rebar from Turkey, exporter Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret told the Court of International Trade. Filing a motion for judgment on July 23, Kaptan said Commerce should have used the contract date as the date of sale (Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret v. United States, CIT # 24-00018).
Litigants sparred at a July 23 oral argument at the Court of International Trade on whether the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on steel wheels from China cover wheels shipped from Thailand with either a rim or a disc made in China. The parties disagreed on whether a prior scope ruling from the Commerce Department spoke to whether these "mixed" goods -- wheels made with either a Chinese-origin rim or disc, but not both -- are covered by the AD/CVD scope (Asia Wheel v. United States, CIT # 23-00096).
The Court of International Trade in a July 17 decision made public July 25 remanded parts and sustained parts of the Commerce Department's antidumping duty investigation on Dutch mushrooms. Judge M. Miller Baker said Commerce properly declined to use adverse facts available against mandatory respondent Prochamp but didn't adequately support its decision to use Germany as the comparison market. Baker said it was unclear how many of Prochamp's German sales were for consumption in Germany.
The Commerce Department and the International Trade Commission published the following Federal Register notices July 25 on AD/CVD proceedings:
The Commerce Department on July 23 extended filing deadlines in various antidumping and countervailing duty proceedings by six days due to the recent global outage of Microsoft systems caused by a software update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike.