CBP wrongly classified animal antibiotic chlortetracycline concentrate feed grade powder (CTC concentrate), resulting in the imposition of Section 301 China tariffs on the imports, Zoetis Services said in a Feb. 24 complaint at the Court of International Trade. While CBP classified the powder as a feed preparation, Zeotis says it should have classified it has a medicament (Zoetis Services LLC v. U.S., CIT #22-00056).
Steel giant U.S. Steel argued that it should be able to file an amicus brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to support antidumping duty petitioner Welspun Tubular in the company's bid to get a full court rehearing on a key AD question. The rehearing request concerns whether the Commerce Department can make a particular market situation adjustment to the sales-below-cost test. U.S. Steel says it can address the importance of PMS provisions in proceedings involving products not made by Welspun (Hyundai Steel Company v. United States, Fed. Cir. #21-1748).
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security granted importer CPW America Co.'s bid for exclusions from paying Section 232 steel and aluminum tariffs following a remand order from the Court of International Trade. In a Feb. 23 submission, BIS said that there was not sufficient domestic U.S. capacity of line pipe to justify rejecting CPW's exclusion requests (CPW America Co. v. United States, CIT #21-00335).
Neither importer Cyber Power Systems (USA) Inc. nor the U.S. succeeded in persuading the Court of International Trade that their side was right in a tiff over the country of origin for shipments of uninterruptible power supplies and a surge voltage protector. Judge Leo Gordon, in a Feb. 24 order, denied both parties' motions for judgment, ordering the litigants to pick dates on which to set up a trial.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit set April 6 as the date for oral argument in a key case on the use of first sale valuation for goods from nonmarket economies. In Meyer v. U.S., the Court of International Trade said that first sale treatment may not be applicable to NME exports (see 2103020040). Litigation is underway at the Federal Circuit over the question, with Meyer most recently arguing that the trade court improperly applied the "dual burden of proof" when denying the importer first sale since the court simply accepted CBP's move of valuing the imports based on their second sale price without scrutiny (see 2201190059) (Meyer Corporation v. U.S., Fed. Cir. #21-1932).
The argument that a Turkish duty drawback program fails to qualify for a drawback adjustment in an antidumping duty case disregards "decades of [Commerce Department] precedent" over the program, Turkish exporter Assan Aluminyum Sanayi ve Ticaret said in a Feb. 22 brief at the Court of International Trade. Responding to AD petitioner Aluminum Association Common Alloy Aluminum Sheet Trade Enforcement Working Group, Assan said that the Turkish Inward Processing Regime (IPR) has repeatedly been found by Commerce to be eligible for a duty drawback adjustment by passing the agency's two-prong analysis on drawback (Assan Aluminyum Sanayi ve Ticaret v. U.S., CIT #21-00246).
The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas dismissed a case brought by Indian steel company JSW Steel that alleged a conspiracy by four U.S. steel companies to engage in a boycott of JSW via the U.S.'s Section 232 national security tariffs. In the Feb. 17 order, Judge Keith Ellison said that JSW "failed to plausibly allege a conspiracy" regarding the defendant, and didn't sufficiently allege that the defendants knew any specific information about the company's business prospects (JSW Steel (USA) v. Nucor Corp., S.D. Texas #21-01842).
The Court of International Trade denied Wheatland Tube Company's bid for a preliminary injunction in a case seeking to compel CBP to respond to requests for information and a tariff classification ruling relating to Section 232 evasion since Wheatland has not shown a likelihood to succeed on the merits. CBP already responded to Wheatland's requests, so the plaintiff has not shown how it could succeed in the case, Judge Timothy Stanceu said.