Importers Wego International Floors, Galleher Corp. and Galleher LLC will appeal a Court of International Trade case on the 2016-17 review of the antidumping duty order on multilayered wood flooring from China. The trade court sustained the Commerce Department's decision to weight average zero percent and adverse facts available antidumping rates to set the AD mark for the non-individually examined respondents (see 2409180044). CIT previously remanded Commerce's decision to use a simple average of the zero and AFA rates, instructing the agency to use a weighted average of the marks. The result was a 31.63% AD rate for the separate rate companies (Fusong Jinlong Wooden Group Co. v. United States, CIT Consol. # 19-00144).

The Commerce Department wrongly determined in a scope ruling that an importer's pencils hadn’t been substantially transformed in the Philippines solely because a Chinese-origin input, wooden slats, were custom-manufactured for use in pencil production, that importer said in a motion for judgment Nov. 8 (School Specialty v. U.S., CIT # 24-00098).

The Commerce Department erred in finding that the South Korean government's provision of electricity below cost was de facto specific in the 2022 review of the countervailing duty order on cut-to-length carbon-quality steel plate from South Korea, exporter Hyundai Steel Co. argued in a Nov. 12 complaint at the Court of International Trade. Hyundai added that Commerce violated the statute on specificity in CVD cases in relying on the "original electricity consumption data" for its de facto specificity finding (Hyundai Steel Co. v. United States, CIT # 24-00190).

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The U.S. asked the Court of International Trade to amend the preliminary injunction in a suit challenging certain Section 301 action on needles and syringes to reflect the government's stipulation that they will refund any Section 301 duties found to have been unlawfully collected on importer Retractable Technologies' entries. Retractable consented to the move (Retractable Technologies v. United States, CIT # 24-00185).

The Court of International Trade failed to take anti-forced labor advocacy group International Rights Advocates' (IRAdvocates') allegations as true when ruling on whether the group had standing to challenge CBP's inaction on a petition to ban cocoa from Cote d'Ivoire, IRAdvocates argued in its opening brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Nov. 12. The advocacy group said it suffered injury-in-fact, since CBP's "failure to enforce Section 307" deprived the group of a "major tool in its foundational purpose of ending forced child labor in cocoa harvesting" (International Rights Advocates v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 24-2316).

CBP and an importer reached a settlement in four customs cases on the classification of the company's photoresists. The goods were classified by CBP under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 3707.90.32, covering certain chemical preparations for photographic uses, dutiable at 6.5%. The agency agreed to liquidate the entries as sensitizing emulsions under subheading 3707.10.00, dutiable at 3%. The cases were brought by Tokyo Ohka Kogyo America, formerly known as Ohka America, and cover hundreds of the company's entries (Ohka America v. U.S., CIT #s 04-00583, 05-00292) (Tokyo Ohka Kogyo America v. U.S., CIT #s 10-00243, 17-00067).

Tomato exporters led by NS Brands failed to show good cause to untimely intervene in a case on the Commerce Department's 1996 antidumping duty investigation on Mexican tomatoes, petitioner The Florida Tomato Exchange argued on Nov. 8. The petitioner said NS Brands knew when the case started that the parties were challenging Commerce's failure to continue the proceeding and "has shown no reason it could not have timely intervened in this proceeding" (Bioparques de Occidente v. United States, CIT Consol. # 19-00204).

After the Commerce Department made no changes to the results of a 2019-20 administrative review of the antidumping duty order on Chinese solar cells (see 2408300020) after a remand order (see 2405090045), importers and exporters said that the department had failed to follow the trade court’s instructions -- continuing to justify use of a second surrogate to value an input with the argument that it needed that input reported in something other than kilograms even though it itself ordered respondents to report that way (Jinko Solar Import and Export Co. v. United States, CIT # 22-00219).

The Court of International Trade sustained the Commerce Department's decision on remand to not apply partial adverse facts available against exporter Garg Tube in the 2018-19 review of the antidumping duty order on welded carbon steel standard pipes and tubes from India. Judge Claire Kelly issued a confidential decision deciding the matter, giving the parties until Nov. 14 to review the confidential information in the opinion (Garg Tube Export v. U.S., CIT # 21-00169).