The Court of International Trade on May 23 entered a default judgment against importer Rayson Global and its owner Doris Cheng due to their failure to file an answer to the government's complaint accusing them of avoiding antidumping and Section 301 duties on uncovered mattress innersprings from China (United States v. Rayson Global, CIT # 23-00201).

The Court of International Trade was wrong to rule that imported calendar planners should be classified by CBP as diaries instead of calendars, the importer said in its opening brief to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on May 24 (Blue Sky The Color of Imagination v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 24-1710).

The Court of International Trade on May 28 denied the government's motion for partial reconsideration in its customs bond penalty case against surety company Aegis Security Insurance. After the court previously said the U.S. violated an implied contractual term of reasonableness in waiting eight years to demand payment on a customs bond, the government claimed it couldn't reasonably anticipate this would be an issue in this case. Judge Stephen Vaden said the U.S. was clearly on notice this was an issue and, as a result, waived any claims regarding the reasonable time requirement.

The Court of International Trade on May 28 told the Commerce Department to conduct sunset reviews of antidumping duty orders on stilbenic optical brightening agents from Taiwan and China, after the agency revoked the orders after not receiving a timely notice of intent to participate in the reviews. Judge M. Miller Baker said Commerce's regulation, which calls for revocation of the order after no such notice is received, violates the applicable statute, which says Commerce shall conduct the review after receiving either a notice of intent to participate or a substantive response. Because U.S. producer Archroma timely filed a substantive response, Commerce should have started the reviews.

The 323.12% antidumping rate received by quartz countertop exporter Antique Group in an administrative review after it missed a questionnaire deadline by five hours is an abuse of the Commerce Department’s discretion, Court of International Trade Judge Mark Barnett said in a May 28 opinion. The judge ordered Commerce to accept the exporter’s late filing; he also determined that the department’s application of adverse facts available to Antique Group would have been unreasonable even if the court had upheld its rejection of the exporter’s late filing. Addressing petitioner Cambria’s claim, Barnett also concluded that Commerce must also reconsider or further explain its departure from the expected method in calculating nonselected respondents' rate.

The Court of International Trade last week remanded the Commerce Department's finding that Germany's Konzessionsabgabenverordnung (KAV) program, which exempts a fee for gas and power pipeline companies that sell electricity below a certain price point that would otherwise be passed onto consumers, wasn't a specific subsidy. Judge Claire Kelly sent the case back for the fourth time, finding that the agency must further investigate whether an alleged subsidy is de facto specific when facts give "reasons to believe" the subsidy may be de facto specific.

Exporters of stainless steel flanges from India are close to a settlement with the government to avoid a remand in a case involving an antidumping duty review in which the Commerce Department selected only one respondent (Kisaan Die Tech Private Limited v. U.S., CIT Consol. # 21-00512).

Worthington Industries, a domestic producer, was granted permission by the court to intervene as a defendant in a case regarding the antidumping duty review on steel propane cylinders from Thailand (Sahamitr Pressure Container v. U.S., CIT # 24-00064).

Petitioners and mattress exporters filed two motions for judgment in two similar cases, both challenging the results of the 2020-2022 antidumping duty review of mattresses from Indonesia. The exporters said that their constructed value had been miscalculated, while the petitioner argued that the exporters’ products were not mattress toppers and didn't fit under that exclusion (PT Ecos Jaya Indonesia v. U.S., CIT # 24-00001; Brooklyn Bedding v. U.S., CIT # 24-00002).

The U.S. on May 24 pushed back against a petitioner’s claim that the Commerce Department allowed an exporter too much leeway in the first antidumping duty review of forged steel fluid end blocks from Italy (Ellwood City Forge Co. v. U.S., CIT # 23-00191).