The Court of International Trade in a Sept. 20 order consolidated four cases contesting the Commerce Department's final results in the ninth administrative review of the countervailing duty order on multilayered wood flooring from China. The four cases were brought by lead plaintiffs Zhejiang Dadongwu Greenhome Wood, Evolutions Flooring, Baroque Timber Industries (Zhongshan) Co. and Fine Furniture (Shanghai). The cases were consolidated under the lead action brought by Baroque Timber.

The Court of International Trade in a Sept. 20 paperless order directed the U.S. to respond to an emergency motion from plaintiff Oman Fasteners in a suit challenging the validity of certain Section 232 steel and aluminum duties to comply with the court's most recent order. In April, the trade court ordered Oman Fasteners to make duty deposits for potential Section 232 steel and aluminum duty liability on all entries affected by its case (see 2204150053). The plaintiff previously requested that the court establish an escrow account throughout the stay period pending an appeal of the court's decision. A three-judge panel at the court was not convinced that setting up an escrow account is better than depositing estimated Section 232 duties for affected entries. With five months having gone by since the order, Oman Fasteners filed the confidential emergency motion to compel the U.S. to comply with the order. The court directed the U.S. to respond to the motion (Oman Fasteners v. United States, CIT #20-00037).

CBP did not rely on "disallowed hearsay" when finding that Skyview Cabinet evaded the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on wooden cabinets and vanities and components thereof from China, the U.S. argued in a Sept. 19 reply brief. Responding to Skyview's arguments that CBP improperly relied on an affidavit and business confidential statements made by a corporate investigator, the government said that the importer has put forth no evidence questioning the truthfulness and credibility of the evidence and that the affidavits are not irrelevant to the evasion finding. CBP also did not solely rely on the information in the affidavit alone, the brief said (Skyview Cabinet USA v. United States, CIT #22-00080).

The U.S. was wrong to argue that the Commerce Department does not need to satisfy any criteria when refusing to start a successor-in-interest changed circumstances review, plaintiff GreenFirst Forest Products argued in a Sept. 19 reply brief at the Court of International Trade. The government ignored that both Commerce and the trade court have recognized the agency's practice of looking at whether the agency individually calculated the former company's subsidy rate to deny the successor-in-interest CCR, the plaintiff said (GreenFirst Forest v. U.S., CIT #22-00097).

The Court of International Trade in a Sept. 20 order denied a motion from John Liu and GL Paper Distribution, defendants in a Section 592 penalty case, to strike a portion of the complaint. Liu moved to toss elements of the complaint he deemed to not be relevant to the imports at issue. Judge Jane Restani ruled that striking these parts of the complaint would be "premature," since the matter of relevancy is a "question of evidence" and not meant to be subject to a motion to strike.

The Court of International Trade ruled Sept. 21 that importer Eteros Technologies USA is legally allowed to import goods federally deemed "drug paraphernalia" because Washington state legalized the delivery, possession and manufacture of marijuana-related drug paraphernalia. Judge Gary Katzmann found Eteros is authorized to import motor frame assemblies used to create marijuana harvesting units under the federal exemption section of the Controlled Substances Act. As such, the U.S. cannot legally seize or forfeit Eteros' imports, Katzmann said.

The Commerce Department violated the law by basing the margin for non-individually examined companies in an antidumping duty review only on a mandatory respondent with a zero rate, and not considering another mandatory respondent that got the China-wide rate for failing to cooperate, the American Manufacturers of Multilayered Wood Flooring (AMMWF) argued in a reply brief at the Court of International Trade. Even if the respondent does not cooperate, it remains an individually-examined company and must be used as part of the expected method for the non-individually examined respondents, AMMWF argued (American Manufacturers of Multilayered Wood Flooring v. United States, CIT #21-00595).

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit should allow the U.S. to double its word count in its reply brief in a case on President Donald Trump's move to revoke a tariff exclusion for bifacial solar panels, the U.S. argued in a Sept. 15 brief at the appellate court. The government argued that good cause exists for their motion since it must reply to the issue of presidential authority raised by the appellees along with several alternative problems, and because the importance of the issues in question warrant an enlargement of the word count (Solar Energy Industries Association v. United States, Fed. Cir. #22-1392).

The U.S. Court of International Trade in a Sept. 20 order denied a motion from John Liu and GL Paper Distribution, defendants in a Section 592 penalty case, to strike a portion of the complaint. Liu had moved to strike elements of the complaint he deemed to not be relevant to the imports at issue. Judge Jane Restani ruled that striking these parts of the complaint would be "premature," since the matter of relevancy is a "question of evidence" and not meant to be subject to a motion to strike. Liu also said that because the contested elements of the complaint are "irrelevant," they are prejudicial and could mislead. However, Restani ruled that if Liu is not involved with the companies he says are irrelevant to the case, then this should be proven through evidence and not excluded through a motion to strike.

The Commerce Department properly dropped its use of facts available over a South Korean port usage rights program in a countervailing duty review, the Court of International Trade ruled Sept. 19. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves also found that because the result is a de minimis rate, reviewing whether the program is countervailable "would have no practical significance and is mooted," sustaining Commerce's remand results.