CAFC Rejects Exporter's Bid to Reschedule CAFC Oral Argument Set For Nov. 7

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Oct. 22 rejected exporter Oman Fasteners' bid to reschedule oral argument currently set for Nov. 7 in its appeal involving an antidumping duty review. Oman Fasteners sought to reschedule the oral argument due to its lawyers' unforeseen scheduling conflict involving a separate case at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit (Oman Fasteners v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-1661).

Antidumping petitioner Mid Continent Steel & Wire opposed the motion.

The appeal centers on Oman Fasteners' missed filing deadline in the sixth review of the AD order on steel nails from Oman, which led to a 154.33% total adverse facts available AD rate. Mid Continent said the oral argument shouldn't be moved because, similar to the "events leading to the missed Commerce filing deadline at the heart of this appeal," Oman Fasteners' scheduling "predicament" was "an easily avoidable problem of their own creation and responsibility."

Lawyers for Oman Fasteners, led by Michael Huston at Perkins Coie, sought to reschedule the oral argument after oral argument in a separate case he's litigating before the 3rd Circuit was scheduled for Nov. 6 in Philadelphia. Huston told CAFC he thought the separate case, In re Boy Scouts of America and Delaware BSA LLC, would be scheduled for Nov. 4 or 5, but that the court "unexpectedly and sua sponte rescheduled" the oral argument (see 2410180056).

Huston said he relied on "representations from the Third circuit concerning the scheduling of a hearing and 'sincerely believed' that there would be no conflict for the hearing in this appeal." But, according to Mid Continent, Oman Fasteners' counsel didn't tell the 3rd Circuit that the CAFC had scheduled oral argument in Oman Fasteners' case for Nov. 7.

Mid Continent said that while this is "regrettable," the 3rd Circuit's decision to schedule a hearing on Nov. 6 and the resulting schedule issue is a "matter for Oman Fasteners to address with that court, rather than something justifying significant disruption of proceedings in this court that the Court and parties have tailored their personal and professional schedules to accommodate."

The petitioner said Oman Fasteners failed to acknowledge "that their legal team appearing in this appeal includes other attorneys with significant appellate experience arguing before this court who are actually better informed of the events underlying this appeal." Mid Continent added that its counsel "arranged multiple personal and professional commitments around the existing hearing schedule," adding that it would be "difficult and disruptive to rearrange multiple commitments at this time" to accommodate Oman Fasteners' request.