Antidumping duty petitioner Nucor Corp.'s standards for quantitative data over a level of trade (LOT) adjustment misrepresent the Commerce Department's requirements for quantitative data, AD respondent Productos Laminados de Monterrey (Prolamsa) argued in a reply brief at the Court of International Trade. Nothing on the record suggests that Prolamsa's evidence was "incapable of being verified," the brief said (Productos Laminados de Monterrey S.A. de C.V. v. U.S., CIT #20-00166).
Country of origin cases
An importer seeks a refund of antidumping and countervailing duties for defective plywood that it says should have been valued at less than it was at liquidation, it said in a June 3 motion for summary judgment filed at the Court of International Trade. Bral asked the court to issue an order that the subject merchandise be reappraised to a value equal to 18% of its original value, order the assessment of ad valorum duties on the reappraised value of the merchandise, and order the refund of all excess duties plus interest (Bral Corporation v. United States, CIT # 20-00154).
CBP is imposing "interim measures" on C.I.S. Investments after preliminarily finding in an Enforce and Protest Act (EAPA) investigation that the importer evaded antidumping and countervailing duty orders on Chinese-origin forged steel fittings, according to a May 24 announcement by CBP. The case is based on an allegation by Flatlands that CIS evaded AD/CVD orders by transshipping the subject fittings through Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and Thailand. Flatlands alleges that two exporters in Sri Lanka and one exporter each in Thailand and Indonesia were involved in the transshipment scheme.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued its mandate June 2 in a case originally brought by exporter Nexteel over the second administrative review of the antidumping duty order on oil country tubular goods from South Korea. In the opinion, the appellate court said the Commerce Department didn't properly support its position that a particular market situation existed affecting inputs of the subject merchandise (see 2203110044). The Federal Circuit also sustained Commerce's practice of capping freight revenue when calculating U.S. price. Most recently in the case, respondent SeAH Steel unsuccessfully vied for a full court rehearing (Nexteel Co. Inc. v. United States, CAFC # 21-1334).
The Court of International Trade in a confidential June 1 opinion dismissed a challenge from Turkish steel exporter Borusan Mannesmann Boru Sanayi ve Ticaret seeking the reversal of its denied Section 232 steel and aluminum tariff exclusion requests. In a letter to the litigants, Judge Timothy Reif said that the parties have until June 8 to review the bracketed confidential information and the remainder of the opinion to see if anything else should be redacted from the public versions. The U.S. originally moved to toss the case since the subject entries are not liquidated, and Borusan filed the case under Section 1581(a), which requires a protestable decision to occur before such a claim can be made (see 2108260062). In a public judgment, Reif sided with the U.S., dismissing the case (Borusan Mannesmann Boru Sanayi ve Ticaret v. United States, CIT #21-00186).
Gun sight inserts that use tritium for powerless illumination in low light conditions should be classified in Harmonized Tariff Schedule heading 9022 as apparatus that use beta radiation, rather than in heading 9405 as non-electrical lamps, importer Trijicon said in a complaint filed May 31 at the Court of International Trade. Despite a ruling issued by CBP to the contrary, Trijicon said heading 9022 covers apparatus that use beta radiation regardless of end use, and that the use of beta radiation is more specific for tariff classification purposes and harder to satisfy than lamp (Trijicon Inc. v. United States, CIT # 22-00040).
Plaintiff-appellants in a case challenging the termination of an antidumping duty suspension agreement filed a motion for a panel or full court rehearing at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit after the court found that the appellants made no plausible challenge to the termination. Appellants Bioparques de Occidente, Agricola La Primavera and Kaliroy said the court's decision was made "despite the absence of any briefing or arguments on the matter in this appeal," raising serious fairness and due process concerns (Bioparques de Occidente v. U.S., Fed. Cir. #20-2265).
Industrial diamonds from China further processed into superabbrasives in Romania should not be subject to additional Section 301 tariffs as products of China, Lieber & Solow, which does business as Lands Superabrasives, said in a complaint filed May 27 at the Court of International Trade. The companies argue that the industrial diamond crystals from China became objects of a different character, identity and use after processing in Romania and should be Romanian products for tariff purposes. Lands asked the court to find Romania as the correct country of origin and order CBP to reliquidate the merchandise with refunds of excess duties and interest (Lieber & Solow Ltd. d/b/a Lands Superabrasives, Co. v. United States, CIT # 21-00623).
The Commerce Department again defended the use of the Cohen's d test as part of its differential pricing analysis to detect "masked" dumping in remand results filed on May 26 at the Court of International Trade. Responding to the court's order instructing the agency to address questions on the use of the test raised by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, Commerce said that the appellate court's chief concern -- that the test as used by Commerce did not satisfy certain statistical criteria -- is not applicable in the present case (Marmen Inc. v. United States, CIT #20-00169).
The government is opposing the consolidation or test case designation of four cases involving hardwood plywood imported by Richmond International Forest Products (RIFP) at the Court of International Trade. In a motion filed May 27, the government said RIFP has already proved its products are not of Chinese origin in the case RIFP designated as a test case, but that the court would still need to consider the three other cases on an entry-specific basis (Richmond International Forest Products Inc. v. United States, CIT # 21-00063, 21-00178, 21-00318, 21-00319).