U.S. District Judge Mark Norris for Western Tennessee in Memphis scheduled an April 2025 jury trial on plaintiff James Gragg’s allegations that Crown Castle has refused to vacate property he leased to the company to build a cell tower since the lease expired in April 2022 (see 2402090061), said a clerk’s notice of setting Friday (docket 2:24-cv-02087). Gragg seeks possession of his property, the restoration of his land and compensatory damages. Crown Castle admits only that it leased land in rural Tennessee from Gragg for “a period of years” to build and operate a cell tower, but denies Gragg’s remaining allegations that it refuses to surrender the premises and remove its structures (see 2403040008).

More than a quarter of the U.S. Senate asked the U.S. trade representative to push back against the EU Deforestation-Free Regulation, saying the approach presents "significant compliance issues due to its stringency and ambiguity. One specific concern is the traceability requirement. The EUDR imposes a geolocation traceability requirement that mandates sourcing to the individual plot of land for every shipment of timber product to the EU. In the U.S., 42 percent of the wood fiber used by pulp and paper mills comes from wood chips, forest residuals, and sawmill manufacturing residues -- wood sources that cannot be traced back to an individual forest plot."

The U.S. on March 14 announced another set of sanctions against Israeli nationals for violence, or threats of violence, against Palestinians in the West Bank. The designations follow President Joe Biden's February executive order authorizing sanctions against people responsible for an increase in violence in the region (see 2402010053).

FCC commissioners approved 5-0 a voluntary cyber trust mark program based on National Institute of Standards and Technology criteria during their open meeting Thursday. As expected, commissioners noted changes in the item since a draft circulated three weeks ago (see 2403130047). Also, as expected, the FCC will ask additional questions in a further notice about software and hardware from countries of national security concern and whether data from U.S. citizens will be stored abroad. The FCC was under pressure to make changes.

The FCC Wireless Bureau sought comments, due April 10, on requests from subsidiaries of utility company Exelon for a waiver of rules to grant two additional 800 MHz channel pairs allowing use of mobile-to-mobile communications on the subsidiaries’ 800 MHz land mobile radio systems. Replies are due April 25, said a Monday notice. The subsidiaries “assert that the mobile-to-mobile communications would be utilized at the same power levels currently permitted for mobile units to ensure there is no increased risk of ‘interference to adjacent channel licensees or co-channel licensees,’” the bureau said.

Panelists from the U.S. and Mexico said that cars assembled in Mexico by Chinese-owned firms can't enter the U.S. with USMCA benefits because of the stringent rules of origin, but spent less time talking about how cars manufactured outside China, including in the U.S., could enter under 2.5% most favored nation tariffs.

Honeywell, an importer of chordal, radial and web brake segments used in aircraft wheel and brake assemblies, said in a March 5 motion for judgment that its goods were classifiable under Harmonized Tariff Schedule heading 8803 rather than heading 6307, as CBP ruled (Honeywell International Inc. v. U.S., CIT # 17-00256).

A petitioner in antidumping and countervailing duty cases on chassis from China that later began to import vehicle chassis from Vietnam said the Commerce Department was misapplying the scope of its orders on Chinese chassis from China that it itself had requested (Pitts Enterprises, Inc. v. U.S., CIT # 24-00030).

Many small and mid-sized internet service providers (ISP) have doubts that they will participate widely if at all in the broadband equity, access and deployment (BEAD) program. At ACA Connects' annual summit Wednesday in Washington, President Grant Spellmeyer said members are concerned "about where BEAD is headed" on project requirements and conditions. "Places like Pennsylvania have got some troubling provisions that are slowing members down," he said. "I think you're going to see wildly disparate results across the 50 states." One ISP that operates in multiple states told us it's leaning away from participating in the states with particularly onerous conditions.

A dispute settlement panel at the World Trade Organization on March 5 found that the EU's measures on palm oil and oil palm crop-based biofuels issued under its Renewable Energy Directive are generally compatible with the bloc's WTO commitments, but that elements of the policies violate global trade rules. The panel also weighed in on similar French and Lithuanian measures on the relevant products.