The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of May 11-17:
Court of International Trade
The United States Court of International Trade is a federal court which has national jurisdiction over civil actions regarding the customs and international trade laws of the United States. The Court was established under Article III of the Constitution by the Customs Courts Act of 1980. The Court consists of nine judges appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate and is located in New York City. The Court has jurisdiction throughout the United States and has exclusive jurisdictional authority to decide civil action pertaining to international trade against the United States or entities representing the United States.
The requirement that importers pay duties before bringing tariff classification cases to court is an unconstitutional hurdle that allows CBP to disregard rulings “with impunity” if the duties imposed are too much for the affected importer to bear, said Gregory Teufel, attorney for International Custom Products (ICP), in oral argument before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on May 8. The pay to play scheme is an unconstitutional bar to importers’ right to due process because it allows CBP to deprive them of a “property interest” in the form of a binding ruling without any notice or the opportunity to be heard, said Teufel.
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of May 4-10:
The scope of an exemption for “finished merchandise” from antidumping and countervailing duties on aluminum extrusions from China is now becoming more clear as two court cases with the potential to shake up the Commerce Department’s finished merchandise definition are likely headed toward resolution. Commerce is now consistently using the same reasoning to find products made entirely of aluminum extrusions are subject to antidumping and countervailing duties. The agency’s newfound reliance on the actual language of the orders makes it more difficult for an importer to challenge that reasoning in court, said a lawyer who represents importers of aluminum products.
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of April 27 - May 3:
The Commerce Department recently found a pair of IKEA products do not qualify for the “finished merchandise” exemption from antidumping and countervailing duties on aluminum extrusions from China (A-570-967/C-570-968), continuing to apply its recently developed definition that requires “finished merchandise” include materials other than aluminum extrusions as parts. In two separate scope rulings issued May 27, the agency found that IKEA towel racks and cabinet and drawer handles consist only of aluminum extrusions and fasteners, and are therefore subject to AD/CV duties.
The Court of International Trade on May 1 dismissed an importers challenge of charges that it is circumventing antidumping duties, finding that the importer did not first fully argue its case at the Commerce Department (here). Commerce had found Ceramark Technology was circumventing the AD duty order on small diameter graphite electrodes from China by making 17-inch diameter electrodes that fell just outside the 16-inch maximum diameter in the scope of the AD duty order. According to Commerce, the change was minor enough that the electrodes should still be subject to AD duties. CIT at first sided with Ceramark, sending the anticircumvention determination back to Commerce in September so the agency could address Ceramark’s argument that the companies that originally requested the AD duties had chosen not to cover 17-inch diameter electrodes. However, after Commerce issued its redetermination making new arguments in favor of its finding of circumvention, Ceramark did not file a brief responding to the agency. As a result, the company did not fully argue its case at the administrative level and is not entitled to a judicial review of its case, said CIT.
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of April 20-26:
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the week of April 13-19
Trek Leather Decision on Corporate Officer Liability Confirms 40 Years of Precedent, Says Government
The recent court decision in Trek Leather on corporate employee liability for customs violations does nothing to expand the coverage of customs penalties to employees of corporate importers of record, said the U.S. government in a brief filed April 15 opposing a Supreme Court hearing of the case. Despite consternation from the trade industry that a September 2014 decision of the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit will cause upheaval by subjecting import compliance professionals to “massive penalties” for negligent misstatements on entry documentation (see 1503170027), the controversial decision merely served to confirm over 40 years of Court of International Trade precedent and the plain language of 19 USC 1592, said the government’s brief.