The Court of International Trade dismissed two cases brought by steel importer Voestalpine USA and steel purchaser Bilstein Cold Rolled Steel seeking to retroactively apply a Section 232 steel and aluminum tariff exclusion that was originally issued with a clerical error. Judge Mark Barnett said that the plaintiffs did not seek any relief that the court could grant since the entries eligible for the exclusion had already been liquidated, and the court does not have the power to order their reliquidation.
The Court of International Trade in a May 19 opinion sustained the Commerce Department's remand results in the antidumping administrative review into passenger vehicle and light truck tires, finding that tire exporter Pirelli Tyre Co. rebutted the presumption of Chinese government control for the first 10 months of the review. Pirelli was bought by Chinese company Chem China 10 months into the review, but Commerce originally held that Pirelli was owned by the Chinese government for the entire review. On remand, the agency said that Chem China didn't own Pirelli for the first 10 months, giving the exporter a 1.45% dumping rate for this period.
A group of tech industry associations released a statement May 16 to voice their support for an expansion of the Information Technology Agreement at the World Trade Organization. An expansion would see emerging technologies covered by the tariff-elimination elements of the pact and extend to areas of the globe not currently covered by the ITA, the statement said. Citing a study from the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, the trade associations said that expanding the ITA would add almost $800 billion to global GDP over the next decade.
The following are short summaries of recent CBP NY rulings issued by the agency's National Commodity Specialist Division in New York:
Shrimp exporters Minh Phu Seafood Joint Stock Co.'s and MSeafood Corp.'s surprise at the U.S. government's concession at oral argument that it did not review the entire record in an antidumping duty and countervailing duty evasion case does not stand as proper grounds for supplemental briefing, plaintiff Ad Hoc Shrimp Trade Enforcement Committee (AHSTEC) argued. Submitting a May 13 reply brief at the Court of International Trade, the U.S. producers group argued that the supplemental briefing motion represents a bid to revisit the arguments presented in the case and should be rejected as such.
The Court of International Trade issued a May 17 opinion addressing two cases brought by Voestalpine USA and Bilstein Cold Rolled Steel, the importer and purchaser of entries subject to Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs, respectively. The cases both concern reliquidation requests on various steel entries without the Section 232 duties, based on the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security's approval of exclusion requests. The exclusions each originally contained an invalid Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading, but by the time the error was discovered in both cases, CBP had liquidated the entries with the duties.
The following are short summaries of recent CBP NY rulings issued by the agency's National Commodity Specialist Division in New York:
The Commerce Department has failed to rebut importer M S International's position that the agency failed to get adequate industry support to initiate its antidumping and countervailing duty investigations on quartz surface products from India, the importer told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in a May 11 reply brief. Commerce failed to take into account QSP fabricators in the domestic industry support conclusion, MSI said. In fact, the statute does not allow Commerce to label manufacturers as responsible for "production processes" that create covered merchandise and then allow the agency to exclude them from the domestic support question through a filter of "production-related activities" test, the brief said (Pokarna Engineered Stone Limited v. United States, Fed. Cir. #22-1077).
The Commerce Department properly found affiliated antidumping duty respondents Ghigi 1870 and Pasta Zara failed to cooperate to the best of their ability in reporting the U.S. payment dates for their pasta sales, the Court of International Trade ruled in a May 4 opinion made public May 13. Returning to the trade court to further explain its use of an adverse inference, Commerce said Ghigi's and Zara's errors in reporting their U.S. payment dates was due to "inattention and carelessness." Judge Richard Eaton agreed, upholding the remand.
The plain language of the antidumping duty and countervailing duty orders on aluminum extrusions from China clearly excludes exporter China Custom Manufacturing's solar panel mount assemblies as extrusions fully assembled after importation, CCM along with importer Greentec Engineering argued in a reply brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Since there is no part of the plain language of the order that says a part of plaintiff-appellants' EcoFasten system cannot qualify for the finished merchandise exclusion, the solar panel mounts qualify for the exclusion, the brief said (China Custom Manufacturing v. United States, Fed. Cir. #22-1345).