An importer of dried seaweed brought a complaint Dec. 4 to the Court of International Trade challenging the reclassification of its seaweed “for the first time in 37 years” (Takaokaya USA v. United States, CIT # 24-00213).
New Zealand conservation non-profit Maui and Hector's Dolphin Defenders NZ challenged the National Marine Fisheries Service's 2024 comparability findings on New Zealand's West Coast North Island set-net and trawl fisheries, alleging a host of analytical and legal violations committed by the agency. The group said the comparability findings fail to enforce the Marine Mammal Protection Act, further endangering the Maui dolphin -- an endangered species of which only an estimated 43 remain (Maui and Hector's Dolphin Defenders v. National Marine Fisheries Service, CIT # 24-00218).
A 2012 analysis memorandum from a prior antidumping duty determination should be put on the record of a suit on an anti-circumvention proceeding, the Court of International Trade held on Dec. 5. Granting the government's motion to complete the administrative record, Judge Stephen Vaden dubbed the spat "pedantic" and said the record "should be supplemented."
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The U.S. conflated importer Prysmian Cables and Systems' claims that the Commerce Department improperly denied its requests for Section 232 steel tariff exclusions with its claim that Commerce failed to "perform certain mandatory and discrete actions in responding" to the requests, Prysmian argued in its response to the government's motion to partially dismiss the case (Prysmian Cables and Systems v. U.S., CIT # 24-00101).
The Court of International Trade on Dec. 4 granted importer Incase Design Corp.'s voluntarily dismissal of its suit on the classification of its iPad and iPhone cases. Incase brought the suit in 2016 to contest CBP's classification of the goods under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheadings 3926.10.00, dutiable at 5.3%, and 3926.90.99, dutiable at 5.3%. The company said the goods should have been classified under subheading 4820.30.00, free of duty, or subheading 8473.30.51, free of duty (Incase Design Corp. v. United States, CIT # 16-00181).
Mexican tomato exporter NS Brands said Dec. 3 that the Commerce Department needed to consider the “prejudice to companies now in existence” that resulted from resuming an antidumping duty investigation from 1996 with the same respondents (Bioparques de Occidente v. United States, CIT Consol. # 19-00204).
Anti-forced labor group International Rights Advocates (IRAdvocates) urged the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to reject the government's request for a two-month delay in filing a reply brief in the group's suit seeking CBP to respond to a withhold release order petition to ban cocoa from Cote d'Ivoire. IRAdvocates claimed that every "major delay in CBP doing its statutory duty to ban the importation of cocoa harvested by child slaves condemns thousands of children to a continuation of the horrible condition they must endure" (International Rights Advocates v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 24-2316).
The Commerce Department’s self-developed “levels of trade” test doesn’t comport with U.S. law, especially since the Supreme Court's holding in Loper Bright, Spanish aluminum exporter Compania Valenciana de Aluminio Baux argued Nov. 27 in support of its June motion for judgment (see 2406130052) (Compania Valenciana de Aluminio Baux, S.L.U. v. United States, CIT # 23-00259).
The Court of International Trade on Dec. 5 let the Commerce Department add an analysis memorandum from a previous antidumping proceeding to the administrative record of an anti-circumvention proceeding on Vietnamese circular welded carbon-quality steel pipe. Judge Stephen Vaden dubbed the spat as "pedantic," and said the memo should be part of the record because it was referenced by both Commerce and respondent SeAH Steel VINA Corp.