Aluminum Extrusion Producer to Ask CIT to Reconsider Right to Intervene in EAPA Case

Counsel for an alleged transshipper in a duty evasion scheme, Kingtom Aluminio, plans to ask the Court of International Trade to reconsider a decision it made to deny the company the right to intervene in a case challenging the determination of evasion. In an Enforce and Protect Act case concerning duties on aluminum extrusions from China, CBP found that importer Global Aluminum Distributor evaded the duties by bringing in the extrusions via Kingtom in the Dominican Republic. Global Aluminum says that Kingtom was the actual manufacturer of the goods in question (Global Aluminum Distributor LLC v. U.S., CIT #21-00198).

Judge Richard Eaton ruled on June 21 that Kingtom could not intervene in the case since it failed to prove that its interest in continuing to be able to sell the aluminum extrusions to Global Aluminum without duties is an "interest relating to the property or transaction that is the subject of the action," as required by the court (see 2106210059).

"The idea that you can just say the producer or exporter doesn’t have an interest in the property at issue is just ridiculous," Mary Hodgins, of Morris Manning and counsel for Kingtom, told Trade Law Daily. "How are we supposed to ever defend ourselves? How can we ever get out from such a binding? How can you ever say that as a person selling the goods to the importer, we don’t have an interest in the property at issue? I just don’t think that can be correct."

Should Eaton continue to reject Kingtom's bid to join the litigation as a plaintiff-intervenor, Kingtom is weighing the possibility of an interlocutory appeal of the decision to the U.S, Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, Hodgins said