The Court of International Trade on May 9 said jurisdiction is proper under Section 1581(i), the court's "residual" jurisdiction, for solar cell maker Auxin Solar and solar module designer Concept Clean Energy's challenge to the Commerce Department's antidumping and countervailing duty pause on Southeast Asian solar panels. Judge Timothy Reif said that the case contests Commerce's liquidation instructions and failure to order the collection of duties and not the underlying final determination in the AD/CVD proceedings themselves. In addition, the court allowed nine solar cell exporters and importers to intervene in the case, given that they adequately demonstrated they would be adversely affected by the case. However, Reif said the companies failed to establish intervention as a matter of right and can intervene only due to CIT Rule 24(b), which allows for permissive intervention.

The Court of International Trade in a decision made public May 9 sustained parts and remanded parts of the 2019-20 review of the antidumping duty order on crystalline silicon photovoltaic cells from China. Judge Claire Kelly remanded the Commerce Department's decisions regarding its "solar glass and air freight valuations and its "methodology for calculating" adverse facts available. The judge sustained exporter Trina Solar's separate rate status; valuation of electricity, ocean freight, backsheet and ethylene vinyl acetate for the plaintiffs, led by Jinko Solar Import and Export Co.; use of JA Solar Malaysia's financial statements to set surrogate financial ratios; deduction of Section 301 duties from U.S. price; and use of AFA against the plaintiffs.

In a May 9 ruling, Court of International Trade Judge Claire Kelly held that importer Kent Displays’ children’s e-writing tablets from China were finished electronic goods under Harmonized Tariff Schedule heading 8543, as the government argued, not duty-free LCD screens under heading 9301, as the importer claimed. The holding mooted the dispute about whether Kent’s entry was exempt from Section 301 duties, as at the time the goods were imported, the tariff doesn't cover the relevant tariff subheading. Instead, the importer will owe a 2.6% duty (Kent Displays v. U.S., CIT # 20-00156).

The Court of International Trade on May 8 remanded the Commerce Department's treatment of antidumping duty respondent Assan Aluminyum's raw material costs and its hedging practices due to the agency's failure to address the issues during the AD investigation on aluminum foil from Turkey. Judge Stephen Vaden said Commerce failed to address one of Assan's arguments regarding its raw material costs administratively. He also said the agency's post hoc rationalizations regarding the company's hedging revenues don't square with its treatment of the revenues during the investigation. The judge sustained Commerce's treatment of both Assan's late fees as part of a duty drawback adjustment and of management fees paid by Assan's affiliated U.S. reseller. The court also granted Commerce's voluntary remand request regarding the denominator of the duty drawback adjustment.

The Court of International Trade on May 2 again remanded the Commerce Department's finding that the South Korean government's full allocation of emissions permits under the Emissions Trading System of Korea was a de jure specific subsidy. Judge Mark Barnett said the agency illicitly considered factors used as part of a de facto specificity analysis to assess the program, noting that those factors can't be used to find if the program is specific as a matter of law. However, the judge sustained Commerce's findings that the full allotment amounted to a financial contribution to respondent Hyundai Steel Co. and that the company benefited from the allotment.

The Court of International Trade on May 2 sustained the Commerce Department's rejection of exporter Sahamitr Pressure Container's allocation method for its certification expenses in the 2019-20 review of the antidumping duty order on steel propane cylinders from Thailand. Judge M. Miller Baker said Commerce had the authority to pick an allocation method that gave the exporter a chance to get a price adjustment for certification expenses while "avoiding the distortions reflected in the company's recalculation." The judge added that Commerce properly supported its finding that the allocation method used by Sahamitr was distortive.

The Court of International Trade in an April 19 decision made public April 29 remanded the Commerce Department's second remand results in a case on the 2018 review of the countervailing duty order on carbon and alloy steel cut-to-length plate from South Korea. Judge Mark Barnett for the third time sent back Commerce's decision not to start an investigation into the countervailability of the off-peak sale of electricity. The court said Commerce must address an allegation made by petitioner Nucor Cop. and explain why evidence the company submitted is "insufficient" for the agency to investigate the "off-peak pricing" under the existing "low standard" to open an investigation. Barnett also sustained Commerce's finding that exporter POSCO and input supplier Plantec aren't "cross-owned" due to Nucor's failure to raise the issue administratively.

The Court of International Trade on April 25 reversed the use of adverse facts available for Mexican rebar exporter Simec after the exporter couldn't provide certain downstream sales information by a supplemental questionnaire deadline. Judge Stephen Vaden said the Commerce Department abused its discretion by denying Simec’s timely extension request amid the COVID-19 pandemic, pointing out that three of Simec’s key accountants had died and a fourth had been intubated.

The Court of International Trade on April 24 sustained CBP's decision on remand to find that importer Columbia Aluminum Products didn't evade the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on aluminum extrusions from China, but held that CBP wasn't required to immediately reverse the interim measures on the company upon making a negative remand finding. Judge Timothy Stanceu said that the remand decision "is not in effect prior to the court's sustaining it through the entry of judgment."

The Court of International Trade on April 22 remanded parts of the Commerce Department's 2015 expedited review of the countervailing duty order on softwood lumber products from Canada. Judge Mark Barnett sent back the agency's decision not to account for subsidies received by lumber suppliers to the CVD respondents and its decision to use exporter Fontaine's 2014 fiscal year tax returns to conduct benefit calculations for the 2015 review period. Barnett sustained Commerce's instructions to CBP to liquidate entries from companies that received de minimis rates without regard to CV duties, along with the agency's finding that Canadian and Quebecois logging tax credits were countervailable benefits.

The Court of International Trade on April 19 remanded the International Trade Commission's affirmative injury finding on oil country tubular goods from Argentina, Mexico, Russia and South Korea. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves said it was "unreasonable" for the ITC to view the conditions of competition over a 42-month review period without considering the effects of competition at the end of the period and on the day that it voted, particularly in light of the effect of U.S. sanctions on Russia, imposed over the last four months of the review period. The judge also cited as reasons for the remand the commission's failure to consider contrary evidence of the effects of sanctions on Russian OCTG and the ITC's inclusion of non-subject South Korean imports in its analysis. She upheld the commission's decision to cumulate imports from Argentina and Mexico with goods from Russia and South Korea.

The Court of International Trade on April 19 remanded the Commerce Department's results in the 2019-20 review of the antidumping duty order on multilayered wood flooring from China. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves sent back the agency's pick of Brazil as a surrogate country, along with the use of Brazilian and Malaysian surrogate data, because it failed to cite evidence on the record to support the choice. The court also remanded Commerce's decision to adjust the Brazilian plywood dataset by removing Spanish import data.

The Court of International Trade on April 17 sent back the Commerce Department's finding that exporter East Sea Seafoods Joint Stock Co. established a right to a separate antidumping rate in the 2019-20 review of the AD order on catfish from Vietnam. Judge M. Miller Baker said the agency failed to "show its work." The judge said that, even if Commerce properly granted East Sea a separate rate, it erred in assigning the company its AD rate, which the agency based on its cash deposit rate. Baker additionally sent back Commerce's use of India over Indonesia as the primary surrogate nation in setting exporter NTSF Seafoods Joint Stock Co.'s AD rate.

The Court of International Trade on April 17 sent back the Commerce Department's decision to use the 2018-19 investigation period for its antidumping investigation on fresh tomatoes from Mexico. The investigation was resumed after being suspended multiple times since 1995, wrote Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves, saying that the statute and congressional intent are clear that Commerce, when resuming a suspended investigation, must continue with the original investigation period. The judge made this decision after first finding that U.S. grower Red Sun Farms requested the continuation of the investigation when it made its request in 2019. Choe-Groves said that U.S. companies can make new requests for the continuation of suspended investigations after each suspension.

The Court of International Trade on April 8 sent back the Commerce Department's use of adverse facts available against exporter Garg Tube in the 2018-19 review of the antidumping duty order on welded carbon steel standard pipes and tubes from India. Judge Claire Kelly instructed Commerce to invoke the specific statutory provision on which it relies on remand and explain either how the use of AFA promotes accuracy or how Garg Tube failed to respond to the best of its ability. The judge also rejected Garg Tube's challenge to Commerce's use of the Cohen's d test to root out "masked" dumping due to the company's failure to raise the issue administratively.

The Court of International Trade on April 11 remanded the Commerce Department's duty drawback calculation methodology for exporter Assan Aluminyum that led to a de minimis rate in an antidumping duty investigation on common alloy aluminum sheet from Turkey. Judge Gary Katzmann said Commerce incorrectly applied the drawback adjustment to all Assan's U.S. sales although only some contributed directly to the receipt of duty exemptions in Turkey during the investigation period. The judge also said Commerce failed to fully explain its decision by not addressing two claims from the AD petitioners, the Aluminum Association Common Alloy Aluminum Sheet Trade Enforcement Working Group.

The Court of International Trade on April 10 said that neither the U.S. nor importer Blue Sky the Color of Imagination properly classified entries of four types of notebooks with calendars, ultimately finding that the products fit under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 4820.10.20.10 as "diaries." Judge Jane Restani said that the Harmonized System should be interpreted to provide "conformity" between the French and English versions of the HS. As a result, the judge looked to the French and English definitions of the term "diary," which both describe as a notebook to write what one proposes or remembers what to do.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on April 8 upheld the Court of International Trade's decision to reject importer Rimco's challenge of antidumping and countervailing duties on its steel wheel entries for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. While Rimco filed suit under Section 1581(a) or, Section 1581(i) in the alternative, Judges Sharon Prost, Richard Taranto and Todd Hughes said that jurisdiction would have been proper under Section 1581(c) since the action's "true nature" was contesting a decision made by the Commerce Department.

The Court of International Trade on April 8 sustained CBP's decision on remand to find that four importers didn't evade the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on hardwood plywood from China. CBP reversed course on its remand decision after the Commerce Department's scope referral decision finding the companies' products subject to the orders was changed in a separate CIT case. Judge Mark Barnett said the case should be sustained after no parties contested the reversed evasion finding.

The Court of International Trade on April 3 again sent back the Commerce Department's decision to countervail exporter KG Dongbu's three debt-to-equity swaps after initially declining to countervail them in the preceding three countervailing duty reviews on corrosion-resistant steel products from South Korea. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves said Commerce can't reverse its countervailability decisions without new information. The judge also remanded Commerce's decision to pass-through benefits from the three debt-to-equity restructurings to KG Dongbu after its ownership changed between the prior three and present reviews, along with the agency's calculation of the company's creditworthiness benchmark and unequityworthy discount rate.

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 4 sustained the Commerce Department's 2020-21 review of the antidumping duty order on steel concrete reinforcing bar from Turkey. Judge Jane Restani said Commerce's use of the invoice date as the date of sale instead of the contract date for both respondents, Kaptan Demir and Colakoglu Metalurji, was properly supported. The judge said evidence from past reviews supports using the invoice date. She said terms of the contract permitted deviation in a material term and the quantities listed on the invoice were "materially different from those in the contract."

The Court of International Trade in a March 11 decision made public April 1 sent back the Commerce Department's use of a simple average of a zero percent and an adverse facts available antidumping rate to set the separate AD rate in the 2016-17 review of the order on multilayered wood flooring from China. Judge Richard Eaton said that because Commerce had Sino-Maple (Jiangsu) Co.'s aggregate U.S. sales information, the lack of transaction-specific U.S. sales data for the exporter didn't support departing from the expected method, which requires a weighted average of the zero and AFA rates.

The Court of International Trade on April 1 lifted a temporary ban on nine fish types from New Zealand after the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration made new comparability findings regarding the wildlife protections on New Zealand's West Coast North Island inshore trawl and set net fisheries. The ban's lifting, which went unopposed by all parties, came after NOAA said that New Zealand established that its fisheries satisfy the provisions of the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The suit was brought by conservation groups seeking to protect the Maui dolphin.

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 Court of International Trade on March 20 sustained the International Trade Commission's decision not to cumulate goods from Brazil with other countries that are part of the five-year sunset review of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on cold-rolled steel flat products from Brazil, China, India, Japan, South Korea and the U.K. Judge Gary Katzmann held that the commission's analysis didn't "engage in impermissibly 'circular' reasoning," the ITC's treatment of Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs didn't impermissibly depart from past agency practice and the commission appropriately explained its decision not to cumulate Brazil's goods.

The Court of International Trade on March 18 said the U.S. government's eight-year delay in demanding surety company Aegis Security Insurance Co. pay a customs bond for Chinese garlic entries was "unreasonable and a breach of contract." Judge Stephen Vaden said that while the six-year statute of limitations runs from the date CBP issues a bill and not the liquidation date, the eight-year delay in issuing the bill violated the "reasonable time requirement," which is an implied contractual term. Vaden also held that Aegis' "impairment of suretyship" defense failed since the surety could have made a claim with its insurer.

The Court of International Trade on March 11 sustained the Commerce Department's remand results excluding importer Crane Resistoflex's ductile iron lap joint flanges from the antidumping duty order on pipe fittings from China. Judge Timothy Stanceu previously remanded the scope ruling on the grounds that it wasn't in a form that could be sustained by the court. Commerce said a Federal Register notice will be published stating that Crane's flanges are outside the order's scope.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on March 7 sustained CBP's classification of importer RKW Klerks' net wrap products used in hay baling machines under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 6005.39.00 as "warp knit fabric," dutiable at 10%, instead of the importer's subheading of 8433.90.50, as "parts" of harvesting machinery. Judges Richard Taranto, Raymond Chen and Tiffany Cunningham said the net wraps are not "parts" as defined by the HTS since the wraps have "additional function outside the machine." The court added that a "consumable" item, "like bullets in a gun," isn't solely meant for use within the machine "simply because it is used exclusively by the machine."

The Court of International Trade on March 6 sustained the Commerce Department's fourth remand results excluding Star Pipe Products' ductile iron flanges from the antidumping duty order on cast iron pipe fittings from China. Judge Timothy Stanceu said that Commerce appropriately considered (k)(1) sources given the uncertainty of whether Star Pipe's flanges plainly fit under the order and that substantial evidence backs the conclusion the flanges aren't subject to the order. The judge also said that the agency didn't base its fourth remand results on the "end use" limitation, as suggested by AD petitioner ASC Engineered Solutions.

The Court of International Trade on March 5 sustained the Commerce Department's remand results in a suit on the antidumping investigation on raw honey from Argentina. Judge Claire Kelly said Commerce properly used exporter Nexco's acquisition costs as a proxy for its suppliers' costs of production. Because the statute emphasizes finding whether the goods are sold at below fair value, the agency's departure from its normal practice of using the suppliers' data is "justified," Kelly said. The judge also upheld Commerce's comparison of Nexco's normal values based on third country sales prices and U.S. sales prices on a monthly, rather than quarterly, basis.

The Court of International Trade on March 1 denied importer Diamond Tools Technology's application for attorney fees in an Enforce and Protect Act lawsuit, finding that "the government was justified in litigating its position" regarding the finding of evasion since the "underlying legal issues were ones of first impression." The issues of whether CBP is bound by the timeline created by the Commerce Department's start of a circumvention inquiry and whether the importer made a "material and false statement or act, or material omission" under EAPA were both novel questions.

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 27 ruled that Chinese exporter Ninestar Corp. wasn't required to exhaust its administrative remedies by appealing to the Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force before challenging its placement on the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act Entity List "under the particular facts of this case." But Judge Gary Katzmann denied the exporter's motion for a preliminary injunction against its placement on the Entity List, finding that the company was unlikely to succeed on three of its four claims against its listing.

The judge said he would later decide on Ninestar's motion to unredact and unseal the record.

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 26 remanded the Commerce Department's remand results in a case on the 15th review of the antidumping duty order on frozen fish fillets from Vietnam. Judge M. Miller Baker again sent back Commerce's failure to treat Indonesia as being at the same level of economic development as Vietnam during the surrogate country selection process. The judge also remanded Commerce's failure to consider evidence from petitioner Catfish Farmers of America regarding exporter NTSF Seafoods Joint Stock Co.'s reporting of its product information, though Baker then sustained Commerce's conclusion regarding the moisture content of NTSF's fish.

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 22 remanded the Commerce Department's remand results in the 2019-20 review of the antidumping duty order on xanthan gum from China. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves rejected the agency's continued use of total adverse facts available against exporters Meihua Group International Trading (Hong Kong) and Xinjiang Meihua Amino Acid Co., finding that the companies submitted evidence on the amount of duties it paid as requested by Commerce. Choe-Groves also said the data, submitted 56 days before the review's preliminary results, wasn't untimely. The court also faulted Commerce for continuing to not conduct a collapsing analysis of exporter Deosen Biochemical, ruling that the company wasn't given adequate notice that it could request a new collapsing analysis.

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 20 sustained the Commerce Department’s application of the Transactions Disregarded Rule to calculate mattress exporter Zinus Indonesia’s normal value in an AD investigation. However, it remanded Commerce’s decision, in constructing Zinus Indonesia’s export price, to apply a quarterly financial ratio to the mattresses of Zinus’ U.S. affiliate that were still in transit at the end of the period of review; doing so was using facts otherwise available, the court said, and Commerce should have first asked Zinus Indonesia for the relevant missing information. CIT also granted Commerce a voluntary remand on its decision to exclude Zinus Korea’s selling expenses from Zinus Indonesia’s constructed value so that the department could consider more evidence that the Korean affiliate helped Zinus Indonesia sell its products (PT. Zinus Global Indonesia v. U.S., CIT # 21-00277).

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 20 remanded the Commerce Department's finding that R210-S engines made by Chongqing Rato Technology Co. fall within the scope of the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on vertical shaft engines between 99cc and up to 225cc from China. Exporter Zhejiang Amerisun Technology Co. argued the R210-S engines have a newly designed horizontal shaft engine outside the orders' scope, while the U.S. said the horizontal shaft engine was equivalent to a modified vertical shaft engine, falling within the orders' scope. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves said Commerce's claim that the orders don't include an exhaustive list of the parts needed for an engine to be covered cuts against "well-established legal precedent regarding scope rulings," and that the agency improperly relied on Wikipedia articles -- an "inherently unreliable source."

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 16 said that importer Trijicon's tritium-powered gun sights are properly classified under CBP's preferred Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading of 9405.50.40 as lamps "or other lighting fittings," dutiable at 6%, instead in subheading 9022.29.80 as "apparatus based on the use of alpha, beta or gamma radiations," free of duty, as argued by Trijicon. Judge Mark Barnett said the tritium-powered products don't qualify as an "apparatus" under either of the definitions offered by Trijicon and the U.S. because they meet the "common definition of a device," given that they are made for a particular purpose: illumination.

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 15 rejected the U.S. government's opposition to a host of lumber importers and exporters' requests to intervene in an antidumping review challenge, siding with nearly 30 years of litigation practice in which non-individually selected companies participate in judicial review of AD/CVD cases. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves said that a request for review in an AD/CVD proceeding is sufficient to justify intervention "as a matter of right" at the trade court, rejecting the government's claim that a party must submit factual information or written argument before Commerce to participate at CIT.

Choe-Groves ruled that Commerce's regulations defining a "party to the proceeding," which requires the submission of factual information or written argument, is at odds with the court's statutory rule on standing to join cases before the court. The judge said the regulation is an attempt to "regulate an area squarely within the Court's purview," adds requirements beyond those in the statute and conflicts with "Congress' expressed intent that access to the CIT should be expanded rather than limited."

The Court of International Trade in a Feb. 8 opinion made public Feb. 13 remanded some aspects of the Commerce Department's antidumping duty investigation on thermal paper from Germany. Judge Gary Katzmann sent back the coding of the static sensitivity product characteristic, classification of Koehler's accrued interest expenses as a cost of production and the use of the Cohen's d test to root out "masked" dumping, staying the case until the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issues a decision in Stupp Corp. v. U.S. He sustained Commerce's inclusion of exporter Koehler Paper's "Blue4est" paper product within the scope of the investigation, the agency's coding of the dynamic sensitivity product characteristic and application of price adjustments for some home market rebates.

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 12 sustained the Commerce Department's decision to use a simple average of standard deviations in the denominator of Cohens d test for detecting "masked" dumping as part of the antidumping investigation of steel nails from Taiwan. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has remanded this decision twice, finding that the academic literature relies on a weighted average. On remand, Commerce said the literature uses a simple average when the sample sizes are equal and that the standard deviation of a full population is "in fact the actual standard deviation." Because the agency used the full population of data in using the Cohen's d test, using a simple average is supported, Judge Claire Kelly said.

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 12 sustained the Commerce Department's final results of the 2019-20 review of the antidumping duty order on retail bags from Malaysia. Judge Stephen Vaden upheld Commerce's use of adverse facts available to set inland freight expense data for U.S. sales the agency found to be unverifiable, as well as the decision not to correct a ministerial error on the grounds that notice of the error was untimely. The court said Commerce gave exporter Euro SME multiple chances to submit verifiable data after the agency found errors in the company's actual weight and inland freight data, making the use of AFA proper due to the resulting gaps in the record.

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 8 sustained the Commerce Department's finding that Chinese wood flooring exporter Fusong Jinlong Group was eligible for a separate rate despite its refusal due to the COVID-19 pandemic to be a mandatory respondent in a 2018-2019 AD review. However, the court allowed Commerce's application of AFA to the exporter, leaving the exporter's AD at the China-wide 85.13% while raising the review's non-individually reviewed respondents' rate from zero to 42.57%. The department made the change under protest after the court found it was treating similarly situated entities differently and hadn’t addressed Jinlong’s separate rate certification on the merits.

The Court of International Trade on Feb. 7 upheld CBP's decision to drop its finding that importer Norca Industries Co. and International Piping & Procurement Group evaded the antidumping duty order on pipe fittings from China. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves said that CBP's finding, made after the Commerce Department conducted a covered merchandise referral on remand, was backed by substantial evidence. The covered merchandise referral found that the importers' carbon steel butt-weld pipe fittings were outside the order's scope.

The Court of International Trade on Jan. 31 remanded for a third time the Commerce Department's antidumping investigation on refillable stainless steel kegs from China, rejecting the agency's continued use of a Mexican data set to calculate a surrogate labor costs value for respondent Ningbo Master International Trade. Judge M. Miller Baker said Brazilian wage data already provided by petitioner American Keg was "correct as a factual matter," making Commerce's reopening of the record on remand to seek additional Mexican data unjustified.

The Court of International Trade on Jan. 30 rejected importer Spirit Aerosystems' claim that the "preceding indented text" to any 10-digit Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading should be read as part of the article description for purposes of claiming a substituted unused merchandise drawback. Spirit's had argued its 10-digit subheading begin with the superior text "For use in civil aircraft" as opposed to "other," avoiding a prohibition on unused merchandise drawback for HTS subheadings that begin with the word "other." But Judge Claire Kelly said the "plain meaning" of the drawback statute refers to the words adjacent to the 10-digit number and not the superior indented text, and that Congress meant to exclude article descriptions with the word "other" to eliminate the need for CBP to find on a case-by-case basis whether goods are sufficiently similar to be eligible for drawback.

The Court of International Trade granted in part and denied in part the government’s motion to bar a wristwatch exporter from using certain supplemental discovery materials that were filed late -- a set of photographs and samples of crystals used in some of the watches -- in any further proceedings. The court barred Ildico from using the photographs, saying the exporter had not made a “sufficiently diligent” search for them earlier. Judge Jane Restani allowed continued use of the sample crystals for now but said she was “mystified” by the actions of both parties (Ildico Inc. v. U.S., CIT # 18-00136).

The Court of International Trade on Jan. 25 denied a U.S. motion to dismiss a customs case for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, finding a protest with CBP was not needed for importer Fraserview Remanufacturing's 80 entries that were deemed liquidated despite a Commerce Department order suspending liquidation. Judge Timothy Reif said that because the statute for deemed liquidation requires the entries to not be suspended, the notices of deemed liquidation did not actually liquidate the entries. As a result, relief at the court was not available under Section 1581(a) but was available under Section 1581(i), the court's "residual" jurisdiction.

The Court of International Trade on Jan. 23 sustained the Commerce Department's finding that oil piping from Brunei and the Philippines circumvented the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on oil country tubular goods from China. Judge M. Miller Baker relied on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit's ruling in Al Ghurair Iron & Steel v. U.S. to reject claims from exporters HLDS (B) Steel and HLD Clark Steel Pipe against Commerce's comparison of their production of oil pipe in Brunei and the Philippines to the production of hot-rolled steel, an oil piping input, in China. The Federal Circuit already found that Commerce can make the comparison because the agency indicated what part of the total value of the goods subject to the inquiries is accounted for by the last step of processing and found that the level of investment is much greater for the production of hot-rolled steel than for oil piping, Baker noted.

The Court of International Trade in a Jan. 19 opinion sustained the Commerce Department's final remand results in a case on the countervailing duty investigation of phosphate fertilizers from Russia. Judge Jane Restani upheld Commerce's decision use of exporter PhosAgro's profit before tax calculation rather than its gross profit figure in its profit ratio calculation. The agency explained that the profit before tax is "narrower and helps to isolate costs for phosphate ore mining and beneficiation activities." Restani said that PhosAgro failed to show that "including expenses broader than those involved in the mining and beneficiation of phosphate ore would bolster Commerce's goal to render an accurate profit ratio."

The Court of International Trade on Jan. 19 granted a stipulation of facts and joint motion for judgment from importer SGS Sports and the U.S. in a customs spat on the classification of reimported swimsuits. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves said that, per the stipulation of facts, SGS Sports' entries qualify for duty-free treatment under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 9801.00.20.

The Court of International Trade on Jan. 16 rejected the Commerce Department's finding that importer Columbia Aluminum Products' door thresholds evaded the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on aluminum extrusions from China. Judge Timothy Stanceu said CBP's final evasion determination and administrative review of the final decision contained "multiple errors, both of fact and of law." For instance, CBP pointed to no evidence showing that Columbia received aluminum door thresholds from China, transshipped the thresholds from China through Vietnam or falsely declared the country of origin as Vietnam instead of China. Stanceu added that CBP erroneously relied on a 2019 anti-circumvention proceeding, which applies only to aluminum extrusions exported from Vietnam made from aluminum previously extruded in China.

The Court of International Trade in a Jan. 5 opinion made public Jan. 16 sustained the Commerce Department's remand results reversing the use of adverse facts available against exporter Oman Fasteners for filing submitted 16 minutes late. The result is a zero percent margin for the company as part of the sixth antidumping review on steel nails from Oman. Judge M. Miller Baker upheld Commerce's use of Oman Fasteners' quarterly costs and not annual costs in calculating the company's cost of production, as well as its decision not to deduct Section 232 steel and aluminum duties from the U.S. price for all of Oman's entries.

The Court of International Trade in a Jan. 8 opinion rejected a motion from the U.S. seeking to retract the court's public opinion sustaining an affirmative injury finding from the International Trade Commission and to bracket information the government said was confidential. Touting the need for transparency in the court system, Judge Stephen Vaden said that the information the government sought to redact -- certain company names and numerical approximations -- is not confidential because the ITC failed to properly bracket it during litigation or the information is publicly available. The judge noted that neither "administrative agencies nor this Court can hide from scrutiny by censoring information," adding that only "truly confidential" information may be hidden from the public.