The Commerce Department lawfully imposed countervailing duties on Vietnam's undervaluation of currency, DOJ said in a March 21 reply brief at the Court of International Trade. Defending Commerce's recent practice to include currency undervaluation as a countervailable benefit, DOJ argued that the currency undervaluation was specific to traders and that the agency's decision to countervail the currency undervaluation is permitted under the statute (Kumho Tire (Vietnam) Co. v. United States, CIT #21-00397).

The Court of International Trade on March 18 dismissed a lawsuit brought by a domestic pipe producer seeking to compel CBP to provide it with information related to an alleged duty evasion scheme by two importers. Judge Timothy Stanceu said that while the trade court did have jurisdiction to hear the case, Wheatland Tube Company improperly submitted its requests for information to CBP, and the agency properly rejected Wheatland's request to revoke a ruling letter.

The Court of International Trade ruled in a March 21 opinion that a customs spat over reimported swimsuits will head to phase two of trial. After sorting through whether a Warehousing Agreement between two related companies sufficed as a lease or similar use agreement during the first phase, Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves ruled that this condition was satisfied for classification under a duty-free tariff provision for U.S. goods returned. The court will now see if the remaining conditions are satisfied in order to grant SGS Sports duty-free treatment of the reimported swimwear.

Dr. Bronner's Magic Soaps should not be allowed to amend its complaint since the case cannot be amended to claim jurisdiction over a denied protest after the 180-day window to file a challenge has lapsed, the Justice Department said in a March 18 reply brief at the Court of International Trade. The U.S. also contested Dr. Bronner's motion since it sought to only amend the complaint and not the summons (All One God Faith v. United States, CIT Consol. #20-00164).

Two chainsaw chain and blade importers, TriLink Saw Chain and TriLink Global, agreed to pay $525,000 to settle allegations that the companies misclassified their imports, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Iowa said. The U.S. alleged that the importers purposely classified their chain saw chains and blades from September 2018 through June 2019 under the wrong Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading to avoid paying Section 301 China tariffs -- a violation of the False Claims Act.

The government can seek reclassification of an importer's merchandise in court at a higher duty rate, even when CBP did not previously pursue the rate increase against the importer, DOJ said in March 15 brief in support of its counterclaim in a tariff classification suit brought by Cyber Power -- which says the counterclaim sets a dangerous precedent (Cyber Power Systems (USA) Inc. v. United States, CIT #21-00200).

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit denied on March 16 U.S. pipe maker Welspun Tubular's motion for rehearing in a case on whether the Commerce Department can make a particular market situation adjustment to the sales-below-cost test when calculating normal value in an antidumping duty proceeding. The appellate court issued a two-page order denying the en banc rehearing motion without a further explanation (Hyundai Steel Company v. United States, Fed. Cir. #21-1748).

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Importer Root Sciences was denied on March 15 its motion for reconsideration of a Court of International Trade ruling that CBP's seizure of Root's imports precluded a deemed exclusion, stripping the court of jurisdiction over the case. Judge Gary Katzmann said that because the reconsideration motion "amounts to nothing more than a disagreement with the court’s reasoning on matters fully litigated, devoid of showing manifest error, it is insufficient to warrant reconsideration and is denied."

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit should affirm the Commerce Department's finding that Al Ghurair Iron & Steel circumvented the antidumping and countervailing duties on corrosion-resistant steel (CORE) products from China by way of transshipment via the United Arab Emirates, defendant-appellee Steel Dynamics said March 14 in a reply brief filed with the appeals court. The UAE company's processing was minor or insignificant, marked by a low level of investment in the UAE, Steel Dynamics said (Al Ghurair Iron & Steel v. United States, Fed. Cir. #22-1199).