Importer van Gelder on May 3 moved to set aside the Court of International Trade's dismissal of its case for failure to prosecute, arguing that its counsel "overlooked -- by virtue of a calendaring mistake" -- the new deadline for the case after it was extended on the customs case management calendar (van Gelder v. U.S., CIT # 21-00160).
The U.S. on May 3 defended its claim that anti-forced labor nonprofit International Rights Advocates doesn't have standing to sue CBP over its inaction in responding to a petition alleging cocoa from Cote d'Ivoire is made with forced child labor. Filing a brief in support of its motion to dismiss the suit, the government argued that IRAdvocates can't show injury-in-fact from CBP's purported inaction, and that the Court of International Trade can't compel discretionary law enforcement action in the form of a withhold release order (International Rights Advocates v. Alejandro Mayorkas, CIT # 23-00165).
An importer whose products weren’t covered by the revocation of an antidumping duty order -- because the importer filed its end-use certifications with post-summary corrections instead of at entry -- argued in the trade court May 1 it couldn’t have fulfilled the requirements of the underlying changed circumstances review because they hadn’t been released yet (Kiswire Inc. v. U.S., CIT Consol. # 22-00181).
The Court of International Trade on May 1 and May 2 dismissed two lawsuits -- one at the behest of the plaintiff, Vinh Hoan Corp., the other for lack of prosecution. Vinh Hoan contested the Commerce Department's final results in the 2021-22 review of the antidumping duty order on frozen fish fillets from Vietnam. Plaintiff's counsel Matthew McConkey said the voluntary dismissal was filed after later action from Commerce "demonstrated our issue of concern was moot, especially as our calculated rate was 0%." Importer van Gelder's suit challenging the classification of its floor covering (vinyl tiles) was dismissed because the suit wasn't removed prior to the expiration of the customs case management calendar's period of time of removal (Vinh Hoan Corp. v. U.S., CIT # 24-00077) (van Gelder v. U.S., CIT # 21-00160).
The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
Importers’ and exporters’ criticism of a continued injury finding on remand, including one argument that the International Trade Commission had relied on trade publications instead of the exporters’ own questionnaire responses (see 2403040049), was simply their unlawful attempt to have the commission “reweigh” the evidence to reach their own preferred result, the ITC said April 29 (OCP S.A. v. U.S., CIT Consol. # 21-00219).
Exporter Carbon Activated Tianjin Co. responded to a host arguments from the U.S. regarding the Commerce Department's surrogate value calculations on a variety of activated carbon inputs as part of the 2019-20 review of the antidumping duty order on activated carbon from China. In a reply brief filed last week at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, Carbon Activated said the Court of International Trade erred in sustaining Commerce's surrogate financial ratios and surrogate values for carbonized metal, coal tar, hydrochloric acid, steam and ocean freight (Carbon Activated v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-2413).
A U.S. motion to reconsider a Court of International Trade decision (see 2404180041) finding that CBP defied the implicit contractual term of reasonableness in waiting eight years to demand payment under a customs bond from a surety company is "both procedurally and substantively flawed," surety Aegis Security Insurance Co. said (U.S. v. Aegis Security Insurance Co., CIT # 20-03628).
The following lawsuits were filed at the Court of International Trade during the weeks of April 15-21 and April 22-28:
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