Jacob Kopnick

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

The U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska granted two Alaska shipping companies' renewed bid for an injunction against CBP penalties for seafood shipments found in violation of the Jones Act, in an Oct. 10 order. After previously ruling against the companies since they hadn't fulfilled a particular part of an exception to the Jones Act, thereby failing to show a likelihood to succeed in their case, Judge Sharon Gleason ruled they now met this condition (Kloosterboer International Forwarding LLC, et al. v. United States, D. Alaska #3:21-00198).

Judge Timothy Reif issued lengthy remand instructions Oct. 12 to the Commerce Department over its application of adverse facts available over China's Export Buyer's Credit Program in a countervailing duty review, citing the scene in the movie Philadelphia in which Denzel Washington's character asks Tom Hanks' character to explain something to him as he would to a two-year old.

The Court of International Trade has jurisdiction to hear a case over CBP's failure to issue full Section 301 refunds, importer FD Sales Company argued in an Oct. 8 reply brief. Although CBP "approved" the importer's protest covering 60 entries seeking the refunds, FD Sales argued that the protest was effectively denied when CBP failed to fully grant the refunds, thus giving CIT jurisdiction under Section 1581(a) (FD Sales Company, LLC v. United States, CIT #21-00224).

The International Trade Commission properly found that imports of polyethylene terephthalate (PET) sheet from Oman injured the U.S. domestic industry, the Court of International Trade said in a Sept. 30 opinion made public Oct. 8. Addressing multiple challenges from the sole Omani exporter of PET sheet, OCTAL Inc., Judge Timothy Reif held that the ITC made all of its determinations in line with the governing statutes and with substantial evidence.

The Court of International Trade does in fact have jurisdiction to hear a case over denied attorney access to confidential information in a safeguard proceeding at the International Trade Commission, counsel for LG Electronics told the court in an Oct. 6 reply brief. The denial of access to the proceeding constitutes a final agency action, making the denial eligible for judicial review, the brief said (LG Electronics USA, Inc., et al. v. United States, CIT 21-00520).

An alleged transshipper in an antidumping and countervailing duty evasion investigation was allowed to intervene in a case at the Court of International Trade, per an Oct. 7 order. Kingtom Aluminio was originally denied the right to intervene for failing to show a legally protectable interest in the case. Judge Richard Eaton changed his tune in the most recent order, now agreeing that the company has a protectable interest.

The U.S.'s bid for more time to respond to importer Eteros Technologies USA's motion for judgment should be denied since the Department of Justice has not shown good cause for the extension, Eteros said in an Oct. 7 brief at the Court of International Trade. The case concerns CBP's seizure of Eteros' motor frame assemblies -- part of a marijuana and plant harvesting unit -- under the premise that the assemblies constitute "drug paraphernalia."

The Commerce Department properly found that it had enough industry support to initiate antidumping and countervailing duty investigations into quartz surface products (QSP) from India, the Court of International Trade said in an Oct. 7 decision. Issuing a partial opinion in the case solely to address the concerns of M S International (MSI), Judge Leo Gordon said that Commerce legally interpreted "producers" of QSPs as excluding QSP fabricators.

The Court of International Trade entered partial judgment in a case over the antidumping duty investigation into Chinese quartz surface product in an Oct. 8 order. Having issued a partial decision in September, Judge Leo Gordon said that the remaining issue under litigation is separate from the already-ruled aspects of the case. In September, Gordon upheld the Commerce Department's decision to pick Mexico over Malaysia as a surrogate country for the purposes of calculating normal value in the AD case (see 2109270059). The remaining issue, brought by M S International, concerns whether Commerce had the requisite industry support to initiate the investigation -- an issue for which the court just sided with Commerce in a separate antidumping case (see 2110080035).