Jacob Kopnick

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Dec. 31 denied Canadian lumber exporter J.D. Irving's bid for a full court rehearing of a three-judge panel's rejection of the company's attempt to challenge the denial of an antidumping duty cash deposit rate under Section 1581(i) (J.D. Irving v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-1652).

Exporter Saha Thai Steel Pipe Public Co. petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court earlier this month to hear its antidumping duty scope case. The petition cast the lower court's decision sustaining the inclusion of its production in the scope of the AD order on circular welded carbon steel pipes and tubes from Thailand as a failure to apply the high court's recent decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, which eliminated the principle of deferring to agencies' interpretations of ambiguous statutes (Saha Thai Steel Pipe Public Co. v. Wheatland Tube Co., Sup. Ct. 24-696).

The Court of International Trade sent back the Commerce Department's determination in a covered merchandise referral to exclude certain carbon steel butt-weld pipe fittings made from Chinese fittings that underwent production in Vietnam from the scope of the antidumping duty order on carbon steel butt-weld pipe fittings from China. Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves remanded Commerce's consideration of various (k)(1) sources, including a circumvention finding that took a contrary position.

International trade attorney Moushami Joshi is leaving Pillsbury Winthrop, the firm said in a notice to the Court of International Trade. Joshi joined the firm in 2014 as a foreign attorney in Washington, D.C., becoming a U.S. attorney in 2017. Prior to joining Pillsbury Winthrop, Joshi was an international trade partner at L&L Partners in India.

Jeffrey Neeley, international trade partner at Husch Blackwell, announced he is retiring after over 45 years as a trade attorney. Neeley began his career as an attorney at the International Trade Commission before moving to private practice.

The U.S. agreed to liquidate importer Tingley Rubber Corp.'s latex rubber boot savers under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 6401.99.30, dutiable at 25%, as opposed to subheading 6401.92.90, dutiable at 37.5%, according to a stipulated judgment at the Court of International Trade (Tingley Rubber Corp. v. U.S., CIT # 20-03711).

The parties in a pair of countervailing duty suits asked the Court of International Trade to continue a stay in the cases pending the result of a separate action involving the same parties on whether the Commerce Department can countervail exporter KG Dongbu Steel Co.'s debt-to-equity restructurings. KG Dongbu, the U.S., petitioner Nucor Corp. and the South Korean government asked Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves to continue the stay pending the result of the lead action (KG Dongbu Steel Co. v. United States, CIT #s 23-00055, 24-00056).

Foreign-trade zone goods become "importations" for duty drawback purposes when they are entered for consumption into the U.S. and not when they are admitted into an FTZ, importer King Maker Marketing told the Court of International Trade. Responding to the government's motion to dismiss the company's suit challenging the rejection of its duty drawback claims, King Maker said goods in an FTZ are considered to be outside the customs territory of the U.S., making the "date of importation" the date the goods were withdrawn from the FTZ (King Maker Marketing v. United States, CIT # 24-00134).

The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:

The Commerce Department erred in finding that respondents Heze Huayi Chemical Co. and Juancheng Kangtai Chemical Co. cooperated to the best of their ability despite a failure to produce land-use purchase contracts in the 2021 review of the countervailing duty order on chlorinated isocyanurates from China, petitioners led by Bio-Lab argued (Bio-Lab v. U.S., CIT # 24-00118).