The Court of International Trade ordered that a status conference be held in a case seeking an import ban on fish from New Zealand's West Coast North Island inshore trawl and set net fisheries under the Marine Mammal Protection Act after the plaintiffs filed a stipulation of dismissal (Sea Shepherd New Zealand v. U.S., CIT # 20-00112).
Jacob Kopnick
Jacob Kopnick, Associate Editor, is a reporter for Trade Law Daily and its sister publications Export Compliance Daily and International Trade Today. He joined the Warren Communications News team in early 2021 covering a wide range of topics including trade-related court cases and export issues in Europe and Asia. Jacob's background is in trade policy, having spent time with both CSIS and USTR researching international trade and its complexities. Jacob is a graduate of the University of Michigan with a B.A. in Public Policy.
The U.S. again argued that Byungmin Chae's case at the Court of International Trade challenging one question on his customs broker license exam should be dismissed under the doctrine of res judicata, which calls for the dismissal of cases already settled by the court. The Nebraska resident filed suit after his previous case, which he took all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, saw him fall just one question shy of a passing grade on the April 2018 exam (see 2401230031) (Byungmin Chae v. U.S., CIT # 24-00086).
German paper exporter Koehler asked the Court of International Trade on Aug. 30 to certify for immediate appeal its decision allowing service on the company via its U.S. counsel. Koehler said the issue of service in the case is "appropriate for prompt review" by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit since the issue is a novel one for both CIT and CAFC and "entirely separate from the underlying merits of the case" (United States v. Koehler Oberkirch, CIT # 24-00014).
The U.S. on Sept. 2 seized a "Dassault Falcon 900EX aircraft," which is owned and operated to benefit Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and those associated with him, DOJ announced. The plane was seized in the Dominican Republic and sent to Florida related to alleged export control and sanctions violations.
The following lawsuits were recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
Southwest Airlines argued at the Court of International Trade that the U.S. violated the rules of statutory interpretation when it claimed that the airline isn't entitled to keep Customs Passenger Processing Fees paid by its customers on canceled tickets. Southwest said it "harmonizes" all the sections of the governing statute, 19 U.S.C. Section 58c, while the U.S. reads the law's collection provision in a way that isolates it from the rest of the statute (Southwest Airlines v. U.S, CIT # 22-00141).
The Court of International Trade on Sept. 3 granted Seko Customs Brokerage's bid to voluntarily dismiss its case against CBP's temporary suspension of the brokerage from the Entry Type 86 pilot and Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism programs at the Court of International Trade. Counsel for Seko didn't immediately respond to a request for comment (Seko Customs Brokerage v. United States, CIT # 24-00097).
South Korean exporter Hyundai Steel Co. opposed the Commerce Department's finding on remand that the Korean government's full allocation of carbon emission permits under the Korean Emissions Trading System (K-ETS) during the 2019 review of the countervailing duty order on hot-rolled steel flat products from South Korea was de facto specific. On remand, Commerce switched from a de jure to a de facto specificity finding (Hyundai Steel Co. v. United States, CIT # 22-00170).
California man Mohamad Yassin Alcharihi was sentenced on Aug. 29 to three months in prison for illegally importing an "ancient floor mosaic from Syria depicting the Roman demigod Hercules," the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California announced. Alcharihi was found guilty in June 2023 after a five-day trial of one count of entry of falsely classified imports.
Importer Precision Components filed a reply brief on Aug. 30 at the Court of International Trade in an antidumping scope case, telling the court that the Commerce Department characterized a "raw material as a component and thus impermissibly brought" the materials within the scope of the AD order on tapered roller bearings from China. The record clearly says "the materials at issue are not bearing components or parts of bearings and could not be used in the production of bearings absent significant physical processes performed on the raw materials" (Precision Components v. United States, CIT # 23-00218).