Parties Scrap on Level of Deference to Show Commerce's Definition of 'Partners' Under AD Law

Parties in an antidumping duty case at the Court of International Trade continued their dispute on whether the U.S. Supreme Court's recent decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo should eliminate any deference shown to the Commerce Department's definition of the term "partners" in 19 U.S.C. Section 1677(33) (Ventura Coastal v. U.S., CIT # 23-00009).

Petitioner Ventura Coastal said Commerce's ability to interpret this statute doesn't exist outside of Chevron, the now-defunct standard for deferring to agencies' interpretations of ambiguous statutes, and that the "delegating language" the government relies on was "already in force prior to the passing" of the law at issue. Meanwhile, the government and exporter Louis Dreyfus Company Sucos argue that Commerce's ability to interpret the term "partners" is tied up with Commerce's fact-finding power -- something the high court said to continue showing deference to.

In its suit, Ventura charged that Commerce Department improperly found exporter Louis Dreyfus wasn't affiliated with its main fresh lemon supplier, leading to a de minimis rate for the company in the AD investigation on Brazilian lemon juice. In light of Loper Bright (see 2406280051), the petitioner initially said the decision means the trade court doesn't need to adhere to Commerce's interpretation of 19 U.S.C. Section 1677(33), which defines "affiliation between parties" (see 2407030066).

The petitioner responded to the government's reliance on its "fast track" authority to claim that additional deference is owed to Commerce's definitions of terms under this framework. Ventura said "the operative statute and its delegating language were already in force prior to the passing of the URAA using fast track authority."

Ventura added that Commerce's authority to interpret the statute doesn't exist outside Chevron. The petitioner said while some issues, such as the Cohen's d test, can be sufficiently complex to justify deference, the case here "is purely a matter of the meaning of a common word under a statute," which is "emphatically the role of this Court" under Loper Bright.

The U.S. in its supplemental reply said Ventura offers only dictionary definitions it thinks should control but that an interpretation of the word "untethered" from the record could lead to "absurd results that are contrary to Congress's intent." This outcome "undergirds the logic for affording Commerce deference in interpreting statutory terms in these 'factbound determinations' like the one at issue here."

Defendant-intervenor Louis Dreyfus said Commerce merely exercised its "expressly delegated authority to define and apply" terms of the statute. While Ventura tries to distinguish between the Uruguay Round Agreements Act's delegation of "rulemaking authority" from the authority to "give meaning to the terms of the URAA," this "distinction has no merit," the brief said. The exporter said it's not arguing for unfettered jurisdiction over the law's meaning but rather that the case presents an instance where a certain statute empowers an agency to "decide how a broad statutory term applied to the specific facts found by the agency."

Ventura's proposed definition of the term "partners" is "overly broad, contrary to congressional intent, and provides no guidance to the Court," Louis Dreyfus added. While the petitioner said a plain reading of the law establishes that the defining feature of the partnership is "their common relation to a partnership," there's in fact "no one, plain or ordinary meaning for the term 'partners' and the definition" is both "circular and too broad," the brief said.

A term being general doesn't make it ambiguous but is instead better viewed as an "implied delegation of adjudicative authority to the agency rather than deference to the agency's interpretation of an ambiguous statute," Louis Dreyfus said, citing a recent U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit decision. As a result, it was "logical and within Commerce's delegated authority" to define partners as "companies that engage in joint selling activities or share joint ownership."