The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit rejected a set of domestic steel companies' bid for a rehearing of the court's denial of its bid to intervene in a series of cases challenging denied exclusion requests for Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs.
Court of Federal Appeals Trade activity
The Commerce Department violated the law when it used the total adverse facts available rate for two non-cooperative respondents as the all-others rate in an antidumping duty review, plaintiff-appellants led by Cheng CH International argued in a Dec. 23 opening brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Appealing a Court of International Trade ruling upholding the rate, the appellant said the "punitive, total AFA rate" Commerce assigned the non-individually examined respondents was not based on their actual dumping margin (PrimeSource Building Products v. United States, Fed. Cir. #22-2128).
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Each one of the Commerce Department's four findings challenged in a countervailing duty case challenge is legal and should be sustained, the U.S. argued in a Dec. 9 reply brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The government claimed Commerce's decision not to rely on respondent Marmen Energie's auditor's adjustment was reasonable; the agency reasonably found the additional depreciation for various Class 1 assets conferred a countervailable benefit to Marmen; Commerce's calculation of Marmen's benefit for a tax credit program legally did not include the income tax effects of benefits under the program for past years; and the agency reasonably said that Quebec's on-the-job tax credit program is de facto specific (Quebec v. United States, Fed. Cir. #22-1807).
The only way importer Acquisition 362, doing business as Strategic Import Supply, could have properly challenged a CBP decision on its entries, according to the Court of International Trade, was to file a "[p]remature, overly broad, or indefinite" protest, SIS argued in a Dec. 6 supplemental brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. But these types of protests "do not constitute a proper basis for invoking CIT jurisdiction," the importer claimed, citing a prior Federal Circuit ruling (Acquisition 362 v. United States, Fed. Cir. #22-1161).
The U.S. cannot rely on the Commerce Department's post hoc rationalization of its decision to countervail glass subsidies in a countervailing duty review, plaintiff-appellants, led by Guangzhou Jangho Curtain Wall System Engineering Co., argued in a Dec. 5 reply brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The appellants also said that the government did not take new agency action in making its determination, showing a "kind of bait and switch decision-making" decried in a key Supreme Court case (Taizhou United Imp. & Exp. Co. v. United States, Fed. Cir. 22-2000).
The Commerce Department's remand redetermination concerning an antidumping duty review on oil country tubular goods from South Korea still suffers from "legal and factual flaws" despite the correct conclusion that no particular market situation existed that distorted the costs of production, Nexteel said in its Dec. 2 comments to the Court of International Trade. Nexteel told the court that, due to what it sees as the correct conclusion, CIT should sustain the remand redetermination but should force Commerce to reconsider the PMS issue should it come up before the court in the future (Nexteel and Seah Steel v. U.S. and U.S. Steel CIT # 18-00083).
The Commerce Department in Nov. 29 remand results at the Court of International Trade dropped its particular market situation adjustment from the sales-below-cost test when calculating normal value following a voluntary remand request in an antidumping duty case. The result dropped respondent Saha Thai Steel Pipe Public Company Ltd.'s AD margin from 36.97% to 14.74%. The agency also reduced the margin for non-selected respondent Thai Premium Pipe Co. since it is part of the litigation (Saha Thai Steel Pipe Public Company v. United States, CIT #21-00627).
The Court of International Trade should reconsider its decision to uphold the Commerce Department's use of the Cohen's d test as part of its differential pricing analysis (DPA) to root out "masked" dumping, given a recent U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit decision, plaintiff SeAH Steel Corp. argued in a Nov. 21 reply brief. Responding to the U.S.'s opposition to the rehearing bid, SeAH said that since the Federal Circuit called the use of the Cohen's d test into question in Stupp Corp. v. U.S., the trade court needs to reconsider its ruling made before the CAFC decision (SeAH Steel Corp. v. United States, CIT #19-00086).
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Nov. 18 gave the U.S. more time to file a petition for rehearing in an antidumping duty case. In the case, the Federal Circuit found that the Commerce Department cannot select just one mandatory respondent in an antidumping duty review where multiple exporters have requested a review (see 2208290026). The court ruled that Commerce's interpretation of the statute finding that it can use only one respondent cuts against the statute's unambiguous language. The judges ruled the agency has not shown it to be otherwise reasonable to calculate the all-others rate based on only one respondent and said the directive to find a weighted average gives no reason why it's reasonable to use only a single rate. The U.S. was previously given 60 more days to file the rehearing motion, and now has another 30, giving it until Jan. 11, 2023, to file a petition for rehearing (YC Rubber Co. (North America) v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 21-1489).