The U.S. on Sept. 24 moved to dismiss mattress importer Pay Less Here's suit on the International Trade Commission's critical circumstances finding on mattresses from Burma, saying the company failed to file an entry of appearance in the proceeding. The government said that, as a result of this failure, the company isn't an "interested party" that can challenge the determination at the Court of International Trade (Pay Less Here v. U.S., CIT # 24-00152).

In a post-oral argument submission Sept. 20, Chinese exporters of xanthan gum focused on the government’s claim that they had waived their challenge to the Harmonized Tariff Schedule categorization of bituminous coal in a review by failing to meet the exhaustion requirement (Neimenggu Fufeng Biotechnologies Co. v. U.S., CIT # 23-00068)

Importer Omni Distributors on Sept. 24 voluntarily dismissed its customs case at the Court of International Trade on the classification of its hand sanitizer imports. Omni Distributors said the goods, classifiable under Harmonized Tariff Schedule subheading 3824.99.9297, should qualify for Section 301 exclusions under secondary subheading 9903.88.45. Counsel for the importer declined to comment (Omni Distributors v. United States, CIT # 22-00250).

The U.S. on Sept. 20 defended the Commerce Department’s continued decision on a second remand to use Brazil as the primary surrogate country and Malaysia for the surrogate values of a particular input in a 2019-2020 review of the antidumping duty order on multilayered wood flooring from China (Jiangsu Senmao Bamboo and Wood Industry Co. v. U.S., CIT # 22-00190).

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

The International Trade Commission on Sept. 23 opposed exporter Eregli Demir ve Celik Fabrikalari's (Erdemir's) motion to consolidate three of its appeals at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit involving the sunset review of the antidumping duty order on hot-rolled steel flat products from Turkey (Eregli Demir ve Celik Fabrikalari v. International Trade Commission, Fed. Cir. # 24-2242).

Importer Acquisition 362, doing business as Strategic Import Supply, filed separate notices of dismissal in two cases at the Court of International Trade. In both cases, the importer said CBP refused to explain why it denied a protest on its vehicle parts after the agency assessed antidumping duties 78.55% higher than it had been assigned in a past AD review (see 2407240019 and 2408090021). The cases both said CBP failed to provide adequate reasoning for denying the protests. In one, the company said the protest denial improperly centered on a message from the Commerce Department, which it wasn't given access to. Counsel for the importer didn't immediately respond to request for comment (Acquisition 362, LLC dba Strategic Import Supply, LLC v. U.S., CIT #s 24-00124, -00149).

The U.S. pushed back Sept. 20 against a Turkish steel exporter’s argument that the Commerce Department shouldn’t have determined during a review that its “sale dates” are the invoice dates, rather than dates of contract (see 2407250026) (Kaptan Demir Celik Endustrisi ve Ticaret v. United States, CIT # 24-00018).

The U.S. on Sept. 20 defended its decision on remand to not apply partial adverse facts available against exporter Garg Tube, claiming that the exporter was "fully cooperative," having made multiple attempts to get cost information from an unaffiliated supplier. The government said Commerce couldn't find enough evidence to show that the potential leverage Garg Tube could exert over the supplier supports the use of AFA (Garg Tube Export v. U.S., CIT # 21-00169).

A German exporter of steel used to transport corrosive materials responded Sept. 20 at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to a U.S. claim that the Commerce Department's decision to calculate certain of the exporter’s production costs for a review using the items' sales values was rational because the figures “came from Dillinger’s own books and records” (AG der Dillinger Huttenwerke v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 24-1498).