Kingtom Aluminio S.r.L. v. United States

2025 CIT 86
CourtUnited States Court of International Trade
DecidedJuly 9, 2025
DocketConsol. 22-00072
StatusPublished

This text of 2025 CIT 86 (Kingtom Aluminio S.r.L. v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Court of International Trade primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kingtom Aluminio S.r.L. v. United States, 2025 CIT 86 (cit 2025).

Opinion

Slip Op. 25-86

UNITED STATES COURT OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE __________________________________________ : KINGTOM ALUMINIO S.R.L., : : Plaintiff, : : INDUSTRIAS FELICIANO ALUMINUM, INC., : ET AL., : : Consolidated Plaintiffs, : and : : HIALEAH ALUMINUM SUPPLY, INC., : Before: Richard K. Eaton, Judge ET AL., : : Consol. Court No. 22-00072 Plaintiff-Intervenors : : v. : : UNITED STATES, : : Defendant, : : and : : THE ALUMINUM EXTRUSIONS FAIR TRADE : COMMITTEE, : : Defendant-Intervenor. : __________________________________________:

OPINION

[U.S. Department of Commerce’s Final Results of Redetermination Pursuant to Court Remand are sustained.]

Dated: July 9, 2025

Donald B. Cameron, Julie C. Mendoza, R. Will Planert, Brady W. Mills, Mary S. Hodgins, Eugene Degnan, Jordan L. Fleischer, Nicholas C. Duffey, and Ryan R. Migeed, Morris, Manning & Martin, LLP, of Washington, D.C. for Plaintiff Kingtom Aluminio S.r.L. Consol. Court No. 22-00072 Page 2

Sarah Sprinkle and William Marshall, Sandler, Travis & Rosenberg, P.A., of Washington, D.C. for Consolidated Plaintiffs Industrias Feliciano Aluminum, Inc.; JL Trading Corp.; Puertas y Ventanas; and J.M., Inc.

Augustus Golden, Trial Attorney, Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil Division, U.S. Department of Justice, of Washington, D.C., for Defendant the United States. With him on the brief were Yaakov M. Roth, Acting Assistant Attorney General, Patricia M. McCarthy, Director, and Reginald T. Blades, Jr., Assistant Director. Of Counsel on the brief was Benjamin Juvelier, Attorney, Office of the Chief Counsel for Trade Enforcement & Compliance, U.S. Department of Commerce, of Washington, D.C.

Alan H. Price, Robert E. DeFrancesco, III, Elizabeth S. Lee, Paul A. Devamithran, Wiley Rein LLP, of Washington, D.C. for Defendant-Intervenor The Aluminum Extrusions Fair Trade Committee.

Eaton, Judge: Before the court are the U.S. Department of Commerce’s (“Commerce”)

Final Results of Redetermination Pursuant to Court Remand (Mar. 4, 2025), ECF No. 50-1

(“Remand Results”). See Order (Nov. 6, 2024), ECF No. 49 (granting Commerce’s unopposed

motion for remand). The Remand Results are uncontested.

Because Commerce complied with the court’s remand order and the Remand Results are

supported by substantial evidence and otherwise in accordance with law, and there being no issue

for the court to adjudicate, the Remand Results are sustained.

BACKGROUND

An antidumping duty order on aluminum extrusions from the People’s Republic of China

has been in place since 2011. See Aluminum Extrusions from the People’s Republic of China:

Antidumping Duty Order, 76 Fed. Reg. 30,650 (Dep’t of Commerce May 26, 2011) (“Antidumping

Duty Order”). This case involves a challenge to final results of Commerce’s 2019 administrative

review of the Antidumping Duty Order, which covered the period of review from May 1, 2019, to

April 30, 2020 (“POR”). Aluminum Extrusions From the People’s Republic of China: Final

Results of Antidumping Duty Administrative Review; 2019-2020, 87 Fed. Reg. 7,098 (Dep’t Consol. Court No. 22-00072 Page 3

Commerce Feb. 8, 2022) (“Final Results”) and accompanying Issues and Decision Mem. (Feb. 2,

2022) (“Final IDM”), PR 167, ECF No. 24-2.

Plaintiff Kingtom Aluminio S.r.L. (“Kingtom”) is a manufacturer of aluminum extrusions

in the Dominican Republic. Compl. ¶ 4, ECF No. 8. During the administrative review, Kingtom

submitted a statement of “no shipments” of subject merchandise into the United States during the

POR. See Final IDM at 19.

In the Final Results, Commerce rejected Kingtom’s “no shipment” claim based on a finding

by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (“Customs”), in a separate proceeding, that Kingtom had

violated the Enforce and Protect Act (“EAPA”). Final IDM at 8-9. Specifically, Customs found

that Chinese-origin extrusions were transshipped through Kingtom’s factory in the Dominican

Republic, thereby evading antidumping duties, during a period that overlapped with the POR. Id.

at 19-20. Based on its affirmative determination of evasion, Customs determined that it would

change the categorization of Kingtom’s entries of merchandise from type 01 (non-subject

merchandise) to type 03 (subject merchandise). See id. at 9. Based on Customs’ recategorization

of Kingtom’s entries, Commerce determined that the POR entries were subject to the Antidumping

Duty Order and properly included in the 2019 administrative review. Id. at 19-20.

Then, Customs’ affirmative evasion determination was challenged in this Court in two

separate actions: Global Aluminum Distributor LLC v. United States, Consol. Court No. 21-00198

(“Global Aluminum”) and H&E Home, Inc. v. United States, Consol. Court No. 21-00337 (“H&E

Home”). Ultimately, on remand, Customs reversed its evasion finding with respect to Kingtom in

both cases. This Court sustained Customs’ negative evasion determinations.1 See Global

1 As summarized by Commerce in the Remand Results: Consol. Court No. 22-00072 Page 4

Aluminum Distrib. LLC v. United States, 46 CIT __, __, 585 F. Supp. 3d 1352, 1354-55 (2022);

H&E Home, Inc. v. United States, 48 CIT __, __, 714 F. Supp. 3d 1353, 1356 (2024).

This case, contesting the Final Results of the 2019 administrative review of the

Antidumping Duty Order, was stayed during the pendency of the EAPA cases, Global Aluminum

and H&E Home.

Following Customs’ negative evasion determinations in Global Aluminum and H&E

Home, Commerce filed an unopposed motion in this action asking the court to remand the Final

Results so that Commerce could “revisit the record in light of remand results in Global Aluminum

. . . and H & E Home . . . to determine whether further factual submissions are required, and to

reevaluate Commerce’s determination that certain merchandise is subject to the relevant

antidumping order.” Def.’s Unopposed Mot. Voluntary Remand at 2, ECF No. 48.

Granting the motion, the court lifted the stay in this case and ordered “that the case is

remanded to Commerce to reconsider its determinations in the Final Results and the accompanying

Final IDM, in light of the remand results of Global Aluminum and H&E Home, and, if appropriate,

to reopen the record and to seek additional information and submissions as needed.” Order at 4

(Nov. 6, 2024), ECF No. 49. A remand proceeding thus commenced, and Commerce’s Remand

Results are now before the court.

In Global Aluminum, the Court sustained [Customs’] remand redetermination, which found that there “was not substantial evidence to support a finding of evasion” by Kingtom. Likewise, in H&E Home, the Court sustained [Customs’] remand redetermination, which found that “substantial evidence on the record as a whole does not support a finding of evasion” by Kingtom.

Remand Results at 5. Consol. Court No. 22-00072 Page 5

DISCUSSION

“The court shall hold unlawful any determination, finding, or conclusion found . . . to be

unsupported by substantial evidence on the record, or otherwise not in accordance with law.” 19

U.S.C. § 1516a(b)(1)(B)(i). On remand, Commerce found that Kingtom had no shipments of

subject merchandise during the POR:

In the Initiation Notice for this administrative review, we stated that parties that had “no exports, sales, or entries” of subject merchandise during the POR must notify Commerce. Kingtom timely submitted a No Shipments Letter in response.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
2025 CIT 86, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kingtom-aluminio-srl-v-united-states-cit-2025.