The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on April 4 sustained the Commerce Department's decision that Australian exporter BlueScope Steel (AIS) didn't reimburse its affiliated U.S. importer, BlueScope Steel Americas, for antidumping duties. Judges Kimberly Moore, Todd Hughes and Leonard Stark echoed the Court of International Trade in finding that it would have been "unreasonable" for the exporter to include the AD in the price charged to the importer because the "exporter itself was not responsible for those duties."
Australia and China recently notified the World Trade Organization that they are ending their dispute involving Chinese antidumping and countervailing duties on wine from Australia (see 2310230060. The WTO circulated the notification to WTO members April 3, the trade body announced.
Importer Blockstream Services USA on April 3 moved to set aside the Court of International Trade's April 1 order dismissing its tariff classification challenge for failure to prosecute (see 2404020013) (Blockstream Services USA v. U.S., CIT # 22-00101).
Grace Ocean Private Limited, owner of the vessel that brought down a segment of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore last week, filed a petition in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland on April 1 seeking to avoid liability "for any loss or damage arising out of" the vessel's collision with the bridge. The manager of the M/V Dali vessel, Synergy Marine, also joined the petition (In the Matter of the Petition of Grace Ocean Private Limited, D. Md. # 24-00941).
Countervailing duty petitioner Rebar Trade Action Coalition opened its case at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit against the Commerce Department's decision on remand finding that shipbuilding company Nur Gemicilik ve Tic, an affiliate of respondent Kaptan Demir, is not Kaptan's cross-owned input supplier. Filing an opening brief on April 2, the petitioner said that Commerce originally got it right in cross-attributing Nur's subsidies to Kaptan in the 2018 CVD review on rebar from Turkey (Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 24-1431).
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on April 4 sustained the Commerce Department's finding in an administrative review on hot-rolled steel flat products that Australian exporter BlueScope Steel (AIS) didn't reimburse its affiliated U.S. importer, BlueScope Steel Americas, for antidumping duties. Judges Kimberly Moore, Todd Hughes and Leonard Stark said that while petitioner U.S. Steel can "point to several instances in the record where BlueScope" submitted responses that "could fairly be read to contradict its overall narrative" regarding how it charged its affiliated importer, it's ultimately not enough to "render the agency's decision unreasonable or not based on substantial evidence."
The Court of International Trade on April 1 dismissed a customs suit from Blockstream Services USA for lack of prosecution. The suit was put in the customs case management calendar and not removed "at the expiration of the applicable period of time of removal." Blockstream Services brought the action to contest the classification of its cryptocurrency miners. CBP put the items under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 8543.70.9960, dutiable at 2.6%, while the company argued for subheading 8471.50.0150, free of duty (Blockstream Services USA v. U.S., CIT # 22-00101).
The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security continued to deny importer Seneca Food's eight Section 232 steel tariff exclusion requests for its tin mill products on remand at the Court of International Trade. BIS said that U.S. Steel can make the same products in a sufficient quantity and in a timely manner to satisfy Seneca's needs, prompting the rejection of the exclusion bids (Seneca Foods Corp. v. United States, CIT # 22-00243).
The Court of International Trade in a March 11 decision made public April 1 sent back the Commerce Department's departure from the expected method in setting the separate rate companies' rate in the 2016-17 review on the antidumping duty order on multilayered wood flooring from China.
NEW YORK -- In a marathon four-and-a-half hour oral argument session last week, Court of International Trade Judge Stephen Vaden sharply questioned the International Trade Commission's redaction process in an injury proceeding on phosphate fertilizers (OCP v. United States, CIT Consol. # 21-00219).