The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Court of International Trade in an Aug. 26 order stayed the consideration of the merits of plaintiff Environment One's claims in a case seeking to apply retroactive Section 301 exclusions until the court settles the U.S.'s motion to dismiss the case for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. DOJ moved to stay consideration of Environment One's claim its merchandise falls within the scope of the claimed exclusion, arguing the stay "would advance the interests of justice" and "could render litigation on the nature of plaintiff's imported merchandise to be unnecessary." Judge Mark Barnett agreed (Environment One v. U.S., CIT #22-00124).
The U.S.'s rationale for hitting antidumping respondent Ajmal Steel Tubes & Pipes Ind. with adverse facts available -- that the company did not respond to the best of its ability -- is "conclusory, superficial, and unsupported by record evidence," Ajmal argued in an Aug. 26 reply brief at the Court of International Trade. The Commerce Department ignored the entire record when denying one of Ajmal's questionnaire submissions and its extension request, and then applying AFA, since COVID-19 restrictions created an "extraordinary circumstance," and justified the late filing, the brief said (Ajmal Steel Tubes & Pipes Ind. v. United States, CIT #21-00587).
The Commerce Department erred when it continued to rely on adverse facts available despite a remand order invalidating the agency’s original reasoning for the AFA rate, Cabinets To Go (CTG), a U.S. retail chain, said in its Aug. 29 comments filed to the Court of International Trade. CTG intervened in the challenge to a final determination from Commerce’s antidumping duty investigation on wooden cabinets and vanities from China (Dalian Meisen Woodworking v. U.S., CIT # 20-00109) because the calculated rates of its own suppliers were based on AFA rates for Meisen.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
Only an admissibility decision from CBP can stop a deemed exclusion from happening according to the law, importer Root Sciences argued at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in a bid to establish subject-matter jurisdiction in its case over seized imports. The Court of International Trade previously ruled that it doesn't have jurisdiction over cases in which CBP seized the subject goods, finding that a seizure does not constitute an admissibility determination (see 2110070022). Root argued that this decision throws it into a "jurisdictional wilderness" and calls into question the validity of past decisions the trade court relied on for the notion that seizure before the expiration of the 30-day deemed exclusion window stops the running of the statutory deemed exclusion period (Root Sciences v. United States, Fed. Cir. #22-1795).
Wireless carriers supported a December waiver request by proponents of cellular-vehicle-to-everything use of the 5.9 GHz band asking to be able to deploy now (see 2112140070). Most initial comments supported approval of that, and other subsequent waiver requests, though NCTA and a few other commenters had reservations (see 207290032). Other commenters raised patent concerns. Replies were due Monday in docket 19-138.
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the weeks of Aug. 15-21 and 22-28:
International Trade Today is providing readers with the top stories from last week in case they were missed. All articles can be found by searching on the titles or by clicking on the hyperlinked reference number.
The Commerce Department erred in applying adverse facts available to countervailing duty review respondent Qingdao Ge Rui Da Rubber Co. (GRT), the respondent argued in an Aug. 25 complaint at the Court of International Trade. The case concerns the 2020 review of the CVD order on truck and bus tires from China. Commerce hit GRT with a 1.78% AFA rate over the respondent's supposed use of China's Export Buyer's Credit Program -- a position that has repeatedly been struck down by the trade court. After the review, GRT filed its two-count complaint to argue that Commerce erred in using AFA over the EBCP and that "upon information and belief, Commerce erred in other aspects of its Final Results with respect to GRT and the EBC program that will be evident upon review of the administrative record in this case" (Qingdao Ge Rui Da Rubber Co. v. United States, CIT #22-00229).