The U.S. waived its right to reply to a Nebraska man's petition to the U.S. Supreme Court in his case appealing one question from the April 2018 customs broker license exam. Byungmin Chae previously appealed his test results to CBP, the Court of International Trade and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, receiving credit at every step of the way for some questions he challenged but ultimately falling one question shy of a passing grade (Byungmin Chae v. Janet Yellen, U.S. Sup. Ct. # 23-200).
Consolidated plaintiffs in an antidumping case led by German exporter Salzgitter Mannesmann Grobblech asked the Court of International Trade to be severed from the joint AD matter given that its claims have been resolved by the court. In a Sept. 26 motion, Salzgitter said its case has "no overlap" with the one brought by lead plaintiff AG der Dillinger Huttenwerke and "it is likely that significant additional time will be required to reach a final judgment regarding the claims raised by Dillinger" (AG der Dillinger Huttenwerke v. U.S., CIT Consol. # 17-00158).
The Commerce Department's refusal to adjust its threshold for differentiating between different types of pasta as part of the duty calculation in the 2018-19 antidumping review of pasta from Italy violated the law, exporters La Molisana and Valdigrano di Flavio Pagani argued in their Sept. 26 opening brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. La Molisana said Commerce's use of the "protein content on a FDA nutrition fact panel to determine protein content" ignores the different standards used in finding the number of grams of protein (La Molisana v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-2060).
The Commerce Department incorrectly found that the South Korean government's provision of port-usage rights to countervailing duty respondent Hyundai Steel Co. was a countervailable benefit, the Court of International Trade ruled in a Sept. 26 opinion. Judge M. Miller Baker said that Hyundai built the port in exchange for the right to collect third-party fees, so the provision of port-usage rights might not be a benefit but rather a payment for "consideration," as used in contract law terms.
Trade attorney Julia Kuelzow has moved from Kelley Drye, where she worked as an associate, to Fenwick & West, where she now works as a trade and national security associate, per a notice at the Court of International Trade. At Fenwick, Kuelzow's practice centers on export controls and sanctions, shifting from her trade remedies work at Kelley Drye. Prior to working at Kelley Drye, Kuelzow served as a law clerk at CIT and as a junior dispute settlement lawyer at the World Trade Organization, according to her LinkedIn page.
China and the EU held the "10th EU-China High-Level Economic and Trade Dialogue" on Sept. 25, discussing the effect of Russia's war in Ukraine on global economics, food and energy security. Also discussed were "EU concerns on access to the Chinese market," prospects for rebalancing the EU-China trade relationship "on the basis of transparency," and predictability and reciprocity, the European Commission said.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Commerce Department legally excluded importer Siffron's plastic shelf dividers from the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on raw flexible magnets from China, the Court of International Trade ruled in a Sept. 26 opinion. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves said that Commerce reasonably determined that the scope language and the (k)(1) sources, including prior scope rulings and a report from the International Trade Commission, established that the dividers didn't belong in the scope of the orders.
The Commerce Department properly hit exporter SeAH Steel Corp. with adverse facts available due to its failure to submit information on its use of the Korean Export-Import Bank Performance Guarantee program prior to the countervailing duty investigation period, the Court of International Trade ruled in a Sept. 26 opinion.
The U.S. urged the Supreme Court of the United States to reject importer PrimeSource Building Products' petition for a writ of certiorari in a case on the expansion of Section 232 duties onto "derivative" products, telling the high court that PrimeSource's separation of powers claims fall flat. While the importer said the case can give the court a chance to reconsider its approach to nondelegation, the government argued that, under the principle of stare decisis, the petitioner must identify a "special justification" for revisiting established law, which it has failed to do here (PrimeSource Building Products v. U.S., Sup. Ct. # 23-69).