NLMK Pennsylvania Blasts Commerce's Request for Extension to Reconsider Section 232 Exclusions

There is "absolutely no substantive justification" to give the Commerce Department another 91 days to review NLMK Pennsylvania's Section 232 steel and aluminum tariff exclusion requests, the company argued in an April 20 brief opposing the extension bid at the Court of International Trade (NLMK Pennsylvania v. United States, CIT # 21-00507).

"Commerce is clearly able to issue the remand decisions now, and the last-minute plea for more time to engage in a new process, not sanctioned by the regulation or past practice is ill-conceived and ill-founded," NLMK said. "The proposed extension would serve only to unnecessarily delay resolution of this 2021 lawsuit until sometime in 2024. The Motion should, therefore, be denied, and Commerce directed to comply with the Court’s Remand Order by April 24, 2023."

NLMK sought 58 exclusions for two different types of semi-finished stainless steel slabs from Russia, which Commerce rejected after finding that the domestic industry was capable of timely making the slabs in enough quantities. The trade court found that the agency did not properly support the rejections (see 2301230027).

Commerce said it now wants another 91 days to reconsider the exclusion requests because it needs to solicit comments from NLMK and the objectors over a subject-matter expert's observations. But NLMK said Commerce has all the information it needs to issue its remand decisions, adding that this process would throw out the agency's established procedure "which has been followed in this case and thousands of others for years." Commerce "weakly claims that it wishes to do so in the interest of 'openness and transparency,'" NLMK said. "That is, respectfully, bunk."

Soliciting comments on the expert's views is "particularly odd" since Commerce is charged with ruling on the exclusion requests and not the expert, the brief said. "While no one is opposed to 'openness and transparency,' that is simply not the issue at this point," the brief said. "Commerce will satisfy its openness and transparency concerns by making the SME’s views part of the record, and then setting forth, in a sound and reasoned decision, based on the totality of the record, the conclusions it reaches."