Solar cell exporter Risen Energy Co. may not amend its complaint to add a claim against the countervailability of China's Article 26(2) tax program in a suit challenging the 2020 countervailing duty review on solar cells from China, the Court of International Trade ruled in a Nov. 30 opinion. Judge Jane Restani said that because the issue was not raised administratively at any point, Risen now could not bring the claim before the court. Waiving the exhaustion requirement is "inappropriate" because the exporter does not raise a "pure question of law" but one that requires additions to the record, Restani said.

Chinese exporter Ninestar Corp. is likely to show that the Court of International Trade has jurisdiction over the company's challenge to its placement on the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List, the trade court ruled in a Nov. 30 opinion.

Exporters, led by Salzgitter Mannesmann Grobblech, will appeal a Court of International Trade decision sustaining the use of adverse facts available on Salzgitter's sales for which the company could not identify or report the manufacturer in the antidumping duty investigation on cut-to-length carbon and alloy steel plate from Germany. While the trade court upheld the Commerce Department's decision to use facts available in 2019, the court sent back the way Commerce used partial AFA in the investigation. The agency's decision was eventually sustained over Salzgitter's claim that the use of partial AFA was unreasonable or unlawful (see 2311160012). According to the notice of appeal, the companies will take their case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (AG der Dillinger Huttenwerke v. United States, CIT # 17-00158).

The Court of International Trade in a text-only order ordered parties in a suit on the antidumping duty investigation on aluminum foil from Turkey to respond to the government's request for a partial remand regarding the Commerce Department's duty drawback adjustment for respondent Assan Aluminyum Sanayi ve Ticaret. The U.S. said it wants another chance to consider or further explain the "ratio used for the duty drawback adjustment" in the case after considering Assan's arguments (see 2311270064) (Assan Aluminyum Sanayi ve Ticaret v. United States, CIT # 21-00616).

The Commerce Department went too far when it rejected all of Vietnamese exporter Hoa Phat Steel Pipe Co.'s submitted factual information in three anti-circumvention inquiries on light-walled rectangular pipe and tube from China, Taiwan and South Korea, Hoa Phat said in a trio of complaints at the Court of International Trade. The exporter said that while Commerce has some discretion in how it conducts AD proceedings, "there is substantial court precedent that Commerce cannot abuse this discretion" (Hoa Phat Steel Pipe Co. v. United States, CIT #s 23-00248, -00249, -00250).

The Court of International Trade in a Nov. 30 opinion said that it is likely to have jurisdiction over Chinese exporter Ninestar Corp.'s challenge to its placement on the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List. Following Ninestar's motion for a preliminary injunction against its placement on the list, Judge Gary Katzmann ruled more narrowly, holding Ninestar is likely to show that jurisdiction is proper under Section 1581(i), the court's "residual" jurisdiction, which covers any civil action regarding "embargoes or other quantitative restrictions." While the U.S. said the UFLPA Entity List does not create an embargo since it establishes a rebuttable presumption, Katzmann said the court has exerted jurisdiction over similar embargoes where exemptions or reconsideration are granted.

The Court of International Trade in a Nov. 30 opinion denied exporter Risen Energy Co.'s bid to amend its complaint in a case on the 2020 review of the countervailing duty order on solar cells from China. The exporter tried to add a claim that China's Article 26(2) tax program is not a de jure specific countervailable subsidy following a CIT ruling in a separate case brought by Risen, in which the court said the program is not de jure specific. Judge Jane Restani said that because the issue was not raised administratively at any point, Risen now could not bring the claim before the court. Waiving the exhaustion requirement is "inappropriate" because the exporter does not raise a "pure question of law" but one that requires additions to the record, Restani said.

The Court of International Trade on Nov. 22 and Nov. 28 granted voluntary motions to dismiss six customs cases. One case, brought by importer POSCO International America Corp., challenged CBP's denial of its protest claiming an error in how the agency appraised and liquidated one of its entries (POSCO International America Corp. v. U.S., CIT # 21-00421).

The U.S. opposed the bids by two groups of Canadian lumber exporters to intervene in two cases challenging the 2021 review of the antidumping duty order on softwood lumber products from Canada. The government said in its pair of briefs that since the exporters -- one group led by AJ Forest Products and the other by Chaleur Forest Products -- didn't actively participate in the review, they cannot intervene in the lawsuits (Government of Canada v. United States, CIT # 23-00187, -00188).

CBP improperly levied Section 301 duties against Greenington's bamboo furniture imports from China, the importer argued in a Nov. 27 complaint at the Court of International Trade. Greenington said CBP wasn't supported in finding that its entries didn't qualify for a Section 301 exclusion under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 9903.88.67, which covers "household furniture of high-pressure laminated bamboo, other than babies' or children's furniture" set under subheading 9403.82.0015 (Greenington v. United States Customs and Border Protection, CIT # 23-00243).