A Vietnamese exporter and the U.S. both opposed March 20 defendant-intervenors’ motion to consolidate the exporter’s three cases fighting the assignment of adverse facts available to an exporter due to a minor submission delay (Hoa Phat Steel Pipe Co., Ltd. v. U.S., CIT # 23-00250).

Importer Maple Leaf Marketing filed a stipulation of dismissal in its customs suit on the classification of boronized steel tubing. Before the dismissal, the case served as a forum for the government to argue that it could assert counterclaims in customs cases. The U.S. moved to redesignate its counterclaim as a defense, which the Court of International Trade granted after finding that nowhere in Congress' scheme on the classification of goods does the legislative body explicitly let the government assert a counterclaim challenging CBP's classification (see 2306140053). The original counterclaim said that the steel tubes, originally classified by CBP as duty-free U.S. goods returned after repairs, are subject to Section 301 tariffs and correctly classified as unfinished steel tubes (Maple Leaf Marketing v. United States, CIT # 20-03839).

A U.S. petitioner on March 18 again argued that a Dutch preserved mushrooms exporter “significantly impeded” a Commerce Department antidumping duty investigation and that the agency shouldn't have granted the exporter a de minimis AD rate (Giorgio Foods, Inc. v. U.S., CIT # 23-00133).

CBP reversed its finding that four importers evaded the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on hardwood plywood from China on remand at the Court of International Trade. Submitting its remand results on March 20, CBP said that since the Commerce Department reversed its covered merchandise scope decision in a separate trade court case, the importers' goods no longer constitute "covered merchandise" and thus did not evade the AD/CVD orders (Far East American v. United States, CIT Consol. # 22-00213).

The Court of International Trade on March 20 denied U.S. company Deer Park Glycine's bid to consolidate its two cases before the trade court. One case is challenging the Commerce Department's scope ruling which excluded calcium glycinate from the scope of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on glycine from India, Japan, Thailand and China, while the other contests Commerce's rejection of a second scope ruling request on the same product.

The Court of International Trade in an opinion made public March 21 sustained parts and remanded parts of the Commerce Department's decision to start the antidumping duty investigation on oil country tubular goods from Argentina. Judge Claire Kelly upheld Commerce's decision to rely on "other information" instead of polling the industry to calculate industry support for the investigation. However, the judge sent back the agency's finding that the data relied on "accurately reflected industry support, including whether finishing operations were counted twice," in light of evidence submitted by the plaintiffs, led by Tenaris Bay City.

The U.S. on March 18 opposed a motion to consolidate an exporter’s two Court of International Trade cases contesting two Commerce Department scope rulings. Those rulings found the exporter’s calcium glycinate was covered by antidumping and countervailing duty orders on glycine from India, Japan, Thailand and China (Deer Park Glycine, LLC v. U.S., CIT #s 23-00238, 24-00016).

The Commerce Department was wrong to find that an importer's “unfinished” carbon steel butt-weld pipe fittings were different than its “rough” fittings because that distinction was not in the language of the relevant scope order, two petitioners said in a March 18 motion for judgment (NORCA Industrial Company, LLC v. U.S., CIT Consol. # 23-00231).

The Court of International Trade on March 20 upheld the International Trade Commission's decision not to cumulate Brazil's imports with the other countries included in the five-year sunset review of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on cold-rolled steel products from Brazil, China, India, Japan, South Korea and the U.K.

Russian exporters PhosAgro, Apatit and Industrial Group Phosphorite will appeal a January Court of International Trade decision sustaining the Commerce Department's use of exporter PhosAgro's profit before tax number instead of its gross profit mark when calculating the company's phosphate mining rights benefit (see 2401190037). The exporter will take the case contesting the countervailing duty investigation on phosphate fertilizers from Russia to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. In its decision, the trade court rejected PhosAgro's clam that its gross profit number "more accurately reflects the commercial reality" of its pricing process (The Mosaic Co. v. United States, CIT Consol. # 21-00117).