CIT Again Says US Steel Can't Intervene in Section 232 Exclusion Denial Challenge

The Court of International Trade in a Dec. 21 opinion denied U.S. Steel Corp.'s motion to intervene in a case brought by Seneca Foods Corp. on the Commerce Department's denial of Section 232 exclusion requests. The trade court cited the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit's decision in California Steel Industries v. U.S., in which the appellate court denied U.S. Steel the right to intervene in a different Section 232 exclusion denial challenge. Judge Gary Katzmann ruled that this precedent establishes that the steel maker doesn't have the right to intervene under the trade court's rules.

In California Steel, the Federal Circuit said that U.S. Steel and other domestic steel companies, as objectors to the exclusion requests, do not have a legally protectable interest in Commerce's exclusion denials (see 2209080024). In moving to intervene in Seneca Foods' case, U.S. Steel urged the trade court not to follow the decision since it was "wrongly decided." The company tried to differentiate its case from California Steel, alleging that unlike in the Federal Circuit case in which the requestors already imported the desired steel products, U.S. Steel began negotiating with Seneca to sell steel tin products, giving the company an interest in the litigation.

Katzmann held that any specific sales opportunities make up the type of economic interests the Federal Circuit already said does not suffice to give a proposed intervenor a legally protectable interest in a Section 232 exclusion denial case. "Because Putative Defendant-Intervenor does not articulate a basis to overcome this threshold obstacle, U.S. Steel’s attempts to distinguish the case at bar fail, and California Steel’s finding of no legally protectable interest controls," the opinion said.

The judge further held that U.S. Steel is not allowed to intervene under its claim that it will be adversely affected by the court's ruling. Katzmann agreed with Seneca that U.S. Steel "misstates the potential [economic] consequences of this case," since the dispute concerns duties Seneca already paid and does not involve "any requests for prospective relief." The judge said that if Seneca wins the case, "the United States Government, and not the domestic steel industry, would pay any resultant duty refunds. ... Accordingly, any attendant competitive injury -- if, indeed, there is any -- to U.S. Steel would be too diffuse to render it 'adversely affected or aggrieved by a decision' of this court."

(Seneca Foods Corp. v. United States, Slip Op. 22-149, CIT #22-00243, dated 12/21/22, Judge Gary Katzmann. Attorneys: James Smith of Covington & Burling for plaintiff Seneca Foods; Tara Hogan for defendant U.S. government; Luke Meisner of Schagrin Associates for proposed defendant-intervenor U.S. Steel)