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A Nice Win to Start the Year!

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 For months you’ve read my blog posts bemoaning the terrible decisions coming out of Washington D.C. related to our case.  Well, with the New Year, we have a fresh start.  And it’s a good one!  The industry has won its first Enforce and Protect Act (EAPA) case involving fencing extrusions.  On December 20, 2023, Fortress withdrew its request for an administrative review, prompting U.S. Customs & Border Protection (CBP) to terminate the administrative review entirely. Termination of the review makes the CBP’s affirmative determination of evasion final.  When terminating the review, CBP clarified that termination does not in any way preclude CBP or other agencies from pursuing additional enforcement actions against Fortress or imposing penalties should the need arise. The other EAPA fencing case is pending, and it appears the respondent is not participating.  We submitted voluntary factual information and the company in question did not submit written arguments by the November 6, 2023, deadline.  CBP’s determination as to evasion is due January 15, 2024.  While this will not turn the entire industry around it is a big win.  The volumes in this case were huge and will fill a few presses in the U.S.

Other updates this month include another scope issue involving a challenge from Custom Metalcrafters that was subsequently dropped.  There is also an EAPA investigation underway in Mexico related to transshipped Chinese extrusions being fashioned into a kit for export into the U.S. from Mexico.  CBP conducted onsite verification at one of these Mexico facilities on November 13-16, 2023.  CBP’s verification report is forthcoming.  CBP extended the deadline for its evasion determination from December 21, 2023, until February 20, 2024, and issued a verification report on December 20, 2023. The deadline for written arguments is January 8, 2024, and the deadline for responses to written arguments is January 23, 2024.

Elsewhere, talk has increased that the General Approved Exclusions (GAEs) on the Aluminum 232 issue may finally come to a resolution in the coming weeks.  As you know we have fought hard to get the GGAEs removed from the 232 Aluminum Extrusion tariffs.  I am hopeful this will come to a good resolution for us, but we have been at this spot in the past only to be disappointed.  Should we prevail, we will have to develop a program in which the AEC monitors exclusion requests to inform members to object.  This paperwork nightmare is one we avoided in the past, only to lose our tariffs because of it.  So, this time, we must protest any objections.  The AEC will work with Mayer Brown, our attorneys in this matter, to build a template members can use to protest exclusion requests.


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