Steel Pipe Importer Challenges Commerce's Denial of Section 232 Tariffs Exclusion Bid

The Commerce Department violated the Administrative Procedure Act by using the same "boilerplate language" used in every Section 232 exclusion request denial when axing CPW America Co.'s bid for relief from the national security tariffs, the company said in a July 19 complaint. By filing suit in the Court of International Trade, CPWA becomes yet another steel importer to challenge what it deems the unlawful denial of a request for exclusion from the Section 232 tariffs. The importer says that Commerce erred in issuing the denial by failing to "meaningfully consider" the evidence submitted by CPWA and find that there were no overriding national security considerations in granting the exclusion request (CPW America Co. v. United States, CIT #21-00335).

CPWA is an importer and distributor of steel pipe products made in Greece. It requested an exclusion for a specialized type of welded line pipe not made in the U.S. designed for a reeling (Reel-Lay) installation method for an offshore, subsea pipeline. The importer believes it properly showed that no domestic pipe mills are capable of making this product to the requisite technical specification required of offshore Reel-Lay applications, and that national security is served by these imports. IPSCO Koppel Tubulars, "a Tenaris company," a domestic pipe mill, was the lone domestic voice to object to the exclusion request.

IPSCO said that it had the capacity to make the pipe. CPWA believes this claim was made without evidence. Commerce subsequently rejected the exclusion bid based on the recommended finding of the International Trade Administration that the subject pipe could be made in the "sufficient and reasonably available amount and of a satisfactory quality."

CPWA challenges "Commerce's failure (i) to verify Tenaris’ claims; (ii) to consider the evidence provided by CPWA that no domestic pipe mills were capable of producing the subject pipe; (iii) to examine the evidence that a particular national security concern would be served in granting CPWA’s exclusion request; and (iv) to provide any reasoned basis for its decision to deny CPWA’s exclusion request, is arbitrary, capricious, and an abuse of discretion."

"Commerce’s denial used the same conclusory, boilerplate language that appears in every decision memorandum posted by Commerce when it denies an exclusion request," CPWA said. However, specific evidence in this case shows that the U.S. did not have the capacity to make the particular type of pipe, the importer said.