The Court of International Trade in a Feb. 8 opinion made public Feb. 13 remanded parts and sustained parts of the Commerce Department's antidumping duty investigation on thermal paper from Germany. Judge Gary Katzmann sustained Commerce's inclusion of exporter Koehler Paper's "Blue4est" paper product within the scope of the investigation, its coding of the dynamic sensitivity product characteristic and its application of price adjustments for some home market rebates.
In a complex case involving antidumping duties on Indian quartz countertops, a defendant-intervenor that represents Indian exporters on Feb. 9 again argued against the AD petitioner’s claim for a 161.56% dumping margin calculated for a review’s non-individually examined respondents (Cambria Company v. U.S., CIT # 23-00007).
The Court of International Trade on Feb. 12 sustained the Commerce Department's use of facts available for antidumping duty respondent Euro SME's inland freight costs for its U.S. sales. Judge Stephen Vaden said that contrary to the exporter's claim that Commerce "threw the book at it," the agency "acted with deliberation, patience, and arguably stayed its hand when it could have drawn adverse inferences more broadly against such a seasoned respondent."
The statutory basis for the U.S. trade representative's lists 3 and 4A tariffs -- Section 307 of the Trade Act of 1930 -- only allows for a "modification" of existing duties and not a "radical and unprecedented seven-fold escalation launching an unbounded trade war with China," appellants in the massive lawsuit challenging the Section 301 tariffs on China told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Feb. 12 (HMTX Industries v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-1891).
The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Feb. 12 dismissed a host of claims from U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit Judge Pauline Newman against three of her colleagues for their investigation on Newman's fitness to continue serving on the court. Judge Christopher Cooper also rejected Newman's bid for an injunction against the CAFC Judicial Council's one-year ban on Newman hearing new cases at the court (see 2309200024) (Hon. Pauline Newman v. Hon. Kimbelry Moore, D.D.C. # 23-01334).
DOJ this week completed the forfeiture of a U.S.-origin Boeing 747 after a monthslong effort to seize the plane from Mahan Air, a sanctioned Iranian airline.
A Missouri-based defense contractor illegally sent export-controlled military technology data overseas to produce items for his contracts with the Defense Department, DOJ announced last week.
CBP found substantial evidence that Exquis, Lollicup USA and Sanster evaded antidumping and countervailing duty orders covering thermal paper, the agency said. It found that all three importers evaded the orders on thermal paper from China and found that Exquis also evaded the AD order on thermal paper from South Korea, CBP said.
The following are short summaries of recent CBP NY rulings issued by the agency's National Commodity Specialist Division in New York:
The Customs Rulings Online Search System (CROSS) was updated Feb. 7-8 with the following headquarters rulings (ruling revocations and modifications will be detailed elsewhere in a separate article as they are announced in the Customs Bulletin):