Revised Section 301 Litigation Case List Spans 194 Pages, Says DOJ Motion

The U.S. Court of International Trade granted DOJ’s second motion requesting leave to file an updated “schedule of cases” related to the first-filed HMTX Industries-Jasco Products Section 301 complaint, said Chief Judge Timothy Stanceu's order (in Pacer) Tuesday in docket 1:20-cv-00177. The motion “concerns overall case management of an unusually large volume of cases, none of which have yet been assigned to an individual Judge,” said DOJ's Tuesday motion. Roughly 3,700 cases have inundated the court, all seeking to vacate the Lists 3 and 4A tariff rulemakings on Chinese imports and refund the duties. The plaintiffs who responded to DOJ’s Sept. 23 motion (in Pacer) for case management procedures have “generally agreed” the cases other than the HMTX-Jasco action “should be stayed while a test-case procedure is implemented,” said DOJ. The revised schedule of pending cases (in Pacer) attached to the motion spans 194 pages and includes actions filed through Monday. Cases have continued trickling, at least one a day. All assert timeliness under the court’s two-year statute of limitations, dating to first payment of the List 3 tariffs upon the entry of goods in 2018.