Opposition to New Aluminum Extrusions Scope 'Hyperbole,' Petitioners Say

The “vast majority” of comments submitted on the scope of ongoing antidumping and countervailing duty investigations on aluminum extrusions from 14 countries are “replete with hyperbole and theoretical situations,” said the petitioners that requested the investigations, in rebuttal comments recently submitted to the Commerce Department.

Other than listing “more examples of in-scope merchandise,” the scope of the new aluminum extrusions investigations is “largely the same” as the scope of the existing AD/CVD orders on aluminum extrusions from China, the U.S. Aluminum Extruders Coalition and the United Steelworkers Union said. The list only clarifies scope coverage, and doesn’t “mean the scope was greatly expanded,” the petitioners said.

The “interpretive framework” established by the original AD/CVD orders on China “largely” applies to the new investigations, the petitioners said. “Most of the examples are products that are covered” by the existing AD/CVD orders, and the products listed in the new scope that are excluded from the scope of the existing orders are “limited.”

In requesting the scope, the petitioners merely “clarified the scope language in certain sections to make it more clear what merchandise is covered and not, and to prevent parties from abusing the exclusions,” the comments said.

The scope of the ongoing investigations on aluminum extrusions from China, Colombia, Ecuador, India, Indonesia, Italy, Malaysia, Mexico, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and Vietnam drew many submissions in opposition ahead of an initial deadline (see 2311270073). They called the new scope overly expansive, and noted concerns that CBP would have difficulty applying the scope.

But commenters’ arguments that importers would have trouble reporting the value of extruded aluminum covered by AD/CVD when they’re incorporated into downstream products are “unpersuasive,” the petitioners said.

“Importers should be able to work with their suppliers to obtain information necessary for their importation of merchandise and should also do so to report the value of in-scope merchandise when necessary,” the petitioners said. “This is not unique to these investigations. Importers already must track various pieces of information about imported extrusions (e.g., with regard to the inputs used to produce the extrusions) to comply with various regulations, and they are able to track the value of the extrusions as well,” they said.

And the existence of AD/CVD orders on freight rail couplers, wooden cabinets and vanities, vertical shaft engines and the current AD/CVD orders on aluminum extrusions themselves show that Commerce “can and has imposed duties on in-scope merchandise that is imported with non-subject merchandise -- whether assembled or unassembled,” the petitioners said.

To find that Commerce can’t set AD/CVD on downstream products that include subject merchandise “would open an enormous loophole in nearly every AD/CVD scope, permitting exporters / importers to simply include non-subject merchandise in a shipment with subject merchandise and avoid the imposition of duties,” the petitioners said.