United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
2007-1099
MAGNOLA METALLURGY, INC.,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
UNITED STATES,
Defendant-Appellee,
and
US MAGNESIUM LLC,
Defendant-Appellee.
Elliot J. Feldman, Baker & Hostetler LLP, of Washington, DC, argued for plaintiff-
appellant. With him on the brief was John J. Burke.
John J. Todor, Attorney Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil Division, United
States Department of Justice, of Washington, DC, argued for defendant-appellee,
United States. On the brief were Peter D. Keisler, Acting Attorney General, Jeanne E.
Davidson, Director, Patricia M. McCarthy, Assistant Director, and Stephen C. Tosini,
Attorney. Of counsel on the brief was William J. Kovatch, Senior Attorney, Office of the
Chief Counsel for Import Administration, United States Department of Commerce, of
Washington, DC.
Jeffrey M. Telep, King & Spalding LLP, of Washington, DC, argued for
defendant-appelle, US Magnesium LLC. With him on the brief was Stephen A. Jones.
Of counsel was Joseph W. Dorn.
Appealed from: United States Court of International Trade
Judge Donald C. Pogue
United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
2007-1099
MAGNOLA METALLURGY, INC.,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
UNITED STATES,
Defendant-Appellee,
and
US MAGNESIUM LLC,
Defendant-Appellee.
___________________________
DECIDED: November 20, 2007
___________________________
Before NEWMAN, RADER, and DYK, Circuit Judges.
DYK, Circuit Judge.
Appellant Magnola Metallurgy, Inc. (“Magnola”), appeals from a final decision of
the Court of International Trade granting judgment to the United States on the agency
record. Magnola Metallurgy, Inc. v. United States, 464 F. Supp. 2d 1376 (Ct. Int’l Trade
2006). We conclude that (1) the Department of Commerce (“Commerce”) was not
required to make a new de novo finding of specificity in its 2003 Administrative Review
of Magnola’s countervailing duty order absent new facts or evidence and (2) Magnola
presented no new facts or evidence that would require Commerce to revisit its 2003
specificity determination in the New Shipper Review proceeding. We accordingly affirm.
BACKGROUND
Magnola produces magnesium in Quebec and exports it to the United States
through its parent company, Noranda Inc. Magnola was incorporated in 1995 and
began magnesium production in 2001. In 1998, Emploi-Québec (“E-Q”), a labor-
focused governmental unit of the Gouvernement du Québec (“GdQ”), initiated the
Manpower Training Measure program (“MTM program”), which was designed to
improve and develop Québec’s labor market. The MTM program provided grants to
companies with approved training programs. It provided eligible small-scale recipients a
maximum reimbursement of $100,000. Major economic projects, however, were
excepted from the $100,000 cap and were entitled to reimbursement of fifty percent of
all training expenses. Projects were eligible for reimbursement at this higher level only
after applicants met additional criteria. Magnola submitted a human resource
development plan to the E-Q in 1998 that met the requirements for eligibility as a major
economic project. The E-Q approved Magnola’s development plan as a major
economic project, and in 1998 and 2000 reimbursed Magnola for fifty percent of all its
training expenses. 1 Magnola received the same fifty percent reimbursements for the
same eligible expenses that every other participant in the MTM program received.
Commerce imposed a countervailing duty order on alloy magnesium in 1992.
Because Magnola was neither in existence nor affiliated with any exporter or producer
1
Magnola asserts that it did not receive a disbursement in 1998, but did
receive disbursements in 1999, 2000, and 2001. The resolution of that dispute makes
no difference to our analysis, however.
2007-1099 2
of magnesium at the time of the 1992 countervailing duty order, it was eligible to request
from Commerce a New Shipper Review pursuant to 19 U.S.C. § 1675(a)(2)(B)(i) rather
than pay the countervailing duty rate set in 1992. Magnola made such a request, and
Commerce conducted a New Shipper Review in 2001 and issued the final results in
2003.
In the New Shipper Review, Commerce found that the MTM program
reimbursements made to Magnola in 1998 and 2000 constituted a countervailable
subsidy from the GdQ as defined in the Tariff Act of 1930. See 19 U.S.C. § 1677(5).
According to the statute, a subsidy is countervailable and thus subject to a duty if it is
specific. Id. A subsidy can be specific either as a matter of law, when the authority or
legislation providing the subsidy “expressly limits access to the subsidy to an enterprise
or industry,” id. § 1677(5A)(D)(i), or as a matter of fact. Id. § 1677(5A)(D)(iii). The
specificity statute provides that a subsidy may be specific as a matter of fact if “[a]n
enterprise or industry receives a disproportionately large amount of the subsidy.”
Id. § 1677(5A)(D)(iii)(III). 2 Commerce found that Magnola had received a
2
Subsection 1677(5A)(D)(iii) provides:
(iii) Where there are reasons to believe that a subsidy may be specific as
a matter of fact, the subsidy is specific if one or more of the following
factors exist:
(I) The actual recipients of the subsidy, whether considered on an
enterprise or industry basis, are limited in number.
(II) An enterprise or industry is a predominant user of the subsidy.
(III) An enterprise or industry receives a disproportionately large
amount of the subsidy.
(IV) The manner in which the authority providing the subsidy has
exercised discretion in the decision to grant the subsidy indicates
that an enterprise or industry is favored over others.
2007-1099 3
disproportionate share of the MTM program funds and categorized the 1998 and 2000
reimbursements as a de facto specific subsidy. Commerce explained:
Because the grants Magnola received were disproportionately large when
compared to other companies, we continue to find them de facto specific
on a company basis under section 771(5A)(D)(iii)(III) of the Act. In
conducting our disproportionality analysis, for the years in which Magnola
received grants, we calculated Magnola's share of total MTM grants on a
percentage basis and compared Magnola's share to the percentage
shares of all other MTM beneficiaries. In so doing, we found that Magnola
received a disproportionate percentage of MTM benefits because, as the
second largest recipient overall, its percentage share was nearly three
times higher than the next highest recipient. Furthermore, Magnola's grant
was greater than the grants received by 99 percent of all the beneficiaries
and over ninety times larger than the typical grant amount. Magnola's
grant was vastly larger than the typical grant, regardless of whether we
included or excluded small-scale recipients from our analysis. In other
words, were we to exclude small-scale recipients, Magnola still received a
disproportionately large amount of subsidy.
J.A. at 68 (agency’s issues and decision memorandum) (emphases added).
Commerce’s policy is to amortize a fraction of the total non-recurring
countervailable subsidy during each period of review (“POR”). 19 C.F.R.
§ 351.524(d)(2)(i). Because Commerce determined that Magnola’s 1998 and 2000
MTM program reimbursements were non-recurring subsidies as defined in 19 C.F.R.
§ 351.524(c), for which the benefit of the subsidy extended beyond the period that the
subsidy was conferred, in the New Shipper Review decision it allocated that benefit over
a fourteen-year amortization period.
In evaluating the factors set forth in subclauses (I), (II), (III), and (IV), the
administering authority shall take into account the extent of diversification
of economic activities within the jurisdiction of the authority providing the
subsidy, and the length of time during which the subsidy program has
been in operation.
2007-1099 4
The statute governing judicial review in countervailing duty cases, 19 U.S.C.
§ 1516a, allows an election with respect to an appeal from a final determination made
pursuant to section 1675. The losing party may appeal either to the Court of
International Trade, pursuant to section 1516a(a), or to a NAFTA panel, pursuant to
section 1516a(g). Magnola elected to appeal the New Shipper Review decision to a
NAFTA panel—a binational panel constituted under Article 1904(2) of the North
American Free Trade Agreement. Pursuant to Article 1904(2), the NAFTA panel
reviews the determination of the investigating authority “to determine whether such
determination was in accordance with the antidumping or countervailing duty law of the
importing party.” North American Free Trade Agreement, U.S.-Can.-Mex., Dec. 17,
1992, 32 I.L.M. 605 (1993). A narrow majority of the NAFTA panel upheld the
specificity determination on the ground that Commerce’s methodology in determining
whether Magnola received a disproportionate share was not unreasonable under U.S.
law and Commerce’s approach was entitled to Chevron deference. Alloy Magnesium
from Canada: Final Results of U.S. Department of Commerce Countervailing Duty New
Shipper Review, Secretariat File No. USA-CDA-2003-1904-02, Decision of the Panel
(Sept. 9, 2005). Of the five panel members, however, only two members joined a single
opinion on that point, while one member concurred separately and two members
dissented. Id.
The countervailing duty statute provides that an exporter subject to a
countervailing duty may seek a periodic administrative review from Commerce at least
once every twelve months. 19 U.S.C. § 1675(a)(1). Magnola sought a periodic
administrative review of the countervailing duty order for the 2003 calendar year.
2007-1099 5
There, Magnola again argued that the New Shipper Review decision was incorrect and
that the MTM program reimbursements were not countervailable subsidies because
Magnola’s share was not “disproportionately large” within the meaning of
section 1677(5A)(D)(iii). Magnola contended that it was not seeking to reopen the
earlier New Shipper Review, but that instead Commerce was required, pursuant to
section 1675(a), to conduct a new de novo specificity determination for the POR.
Moreover, Magnola argued that Commerce had to consider new facts that were not
before it when it conducted the New Shipper Review. Specifically, Magnola asked
Commerce to consider the fact that it received no new disbursements from the MTM
program during the POR, though the program continued making payments to other
beneficiaries. Given this new fact, according to Magnola, Commerce could no longer
find its share of benefits from the MTM program to be disproportionate. Magnola
argued that the specificity statute, which requires Commerce to “take into
account . . . the length of time during which the subsidy program has been in operation,”
19 U.S.C. § 1677(5A)(D)(iii), compelled such a result.
Following earlier decisions, Commerce in the administrative review decision held
that Magnola could only reopen the original specificity determination in the New Shipper
Review if it presented new facts or evidence. In the 2003 administrative review
decision, Commerce explained:
It is the Department's policy not to revisit specificity determinations absent
the presentation of new facts or evidence.
...
We agree with the petitioner that once a determination has been made
regarding whether a non-recurring subsidy was specific (or not) at the time
of bestowal, then that finding holds for the duration of the subsidy benefit
2007-1099 6
barring any new facts or evidence pertaining to the circumstances of the
subsidy's bestowal.
J.A. at 97 (agency’s issues and decision memorandum). Commerce determined that
Magnola had not presented it with any new facts or evidence. It also rejected
Magnola’s argument that it was required during the administrative review to take into
account the length of time that the MTM program had operated since the original New
Shipper Review determination. It found that it had previously accounted for operation
time in the New Shipper Review, and that on review it was merely looking at the
amortized portion of the countervailable subsidy. Commerce explained that the original
specificity determination that Commerce made in the New Shipper Review “holds for the
duration of the subsidy benefit barring any new facts or evidence pertaining to the
circumstances of the subsidy’s bestowal.” Id.
Magnola appealed the 2003 administrative review decision to the Court of
International Trade. The court held that Commerce’s policy to decline to revisit a
specificity determination in a New Shipper Review absent new facts or evidence was
not contrary to the statute and constituted a reasonable interpretation of the statute and
its own regulations. Magnola, 464 F. Supp. 2d at 1382. It also held that Commerce was
not arbitrary or capricious in finding that Magnola had not submitted new evidence
justifying a reopening. See id. at 1383.
Magnola timely appealed. We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C.
§ 1295(a)(5).
DISCUSSION
When Commerce determines that a foreign government or public entity is
providing a countervailable subsidy to manufacturers, producers, or exporters of
2007-1099 7
merchandise imported into the United States, it will impose on that merchandise a
countervailing duty equal to the amount of the net countervailable subsidy. 19 U.S.C.
§ 1671(a). An initial investigation regarding a class of merchandise may be initiated
either by Commerce or by petition of an interested party, such as a domestic producer
of the disputed import. Id. § 1671a(a)-(b). When a new producer or exporter enters the
market after an initial countervailing duty has been established for a class of products,
that new entrant can seek from Commerce an independent countervailing duty review—
a “new shipper review.” Id. § 1675(a)(2)(B). Exporters already subject to a
countervailing duty may also seek from Commerce an administrative review every
twelve months. Id. § 1675(a)(1). In an administrative review, Commerce must “review
and determine the amount of any net countervailable subsidy.” Id.
I
Magnola contends that 19 U.S.C. § 1675(a) requires Commerce to make a de
novo countervailing duty determination for each POR and that Commerce could not
properly rely on the specificity determination made in the New Shipper Review in the
course of the 2003 Administrative Review. We cannot agree.
The pertinent statute provides:
At least once during each 12-month period beginning on the anniversary
of the date of publication of a countervailing duty order under this subtitle
. . . the administering authority, if a request for such a review has been
received and after publication of notice of such review in the Federal
Register, shall—
(A) review and determine the amount of any net countervailable
subsidy,
....
and shall publish in the Federal Register the results of such review,
together with notice of any duty to be assessed, estimated duty to be
deposited, or investigation to be resumed.
2007-1099 8
19 U.S.C. § 1675(a)(1) (emphasis added). Magnola argues that the language “review
and determine the amount of any net countervailable subsidy” dictates that Commerce
must make a de novo countervailability determination for each POR. The language of
the statute, however, is ambiguous, and Commerce has been delegated substantive
rulemaking authority to elaborate the meaning of this ambiguous language. Pesquera
Mares Australes Ltda. v. United States, 266 F.3d 1372, 1381 n.6 (Fed. Cir. 2001).
Under these circumstances, we must defer to Commerce’s interpretation of the statute if
it is reasonable.
Commerce’s own regulations are similarly ambiguous with respect to the
procedures that govern administrative reviews. See 19 C.F.R. § 351.221(a) (“The
procedures for reviews are similar to those followed in investigations.”). Here, however,
Commerce’s interpretation of section 1675(a) is found in the 2003 review decision,
which relies on previous administrative review decisions. Commerce’s policy is to
require “new facts or evidence of changed circumstances” before it will revisit an earlier
specificity determination, such as the one made in the New Shipper Review in this case.
See, e.g., Pure and Alloy Magnesium from Canada: Final Results of the First (1992)
Countervailing Duty Administrative Reviews, 62 Fed. Reg. 13,857 (Mar. 24, 1997).
We have previously held that statutory interpretations articulated by Commerce
during its adjudicatory proceedings are entitled to Chevron deference. Pesquera Mares
Australes, 266 F.3d at 1382. Under Chevron, if Congress has not spoken directly on
the issue, this court addresses whether the agency’s interpretation “is based on a
permissible construction of the statute.” Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v. Natural Res. Def.
Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 842-43 (1984).
2007-1099 9
We previously concluded in a related context that Commerce’s interpretation is
reasonable. In PPG Industries, Inc. v. United States, 978 F.2d 1232 (Fed. Cir. 1992),
we were presented with the inverse situation, that is, whether a program determined not
to be countervailable must be reinvestigated. Id. at 1242. PPG challenged Commerce’s
original specificity determination based on allegedly new evidence, arguing that
Commerce should impose a countervailing duty. Id. at 1241. While PPG did not
directly challenge Commerce’s refusal to reopen absent new evidence, we nonetheless
made clear that Commerce’s reopening policy was reasonable. Id. at 1242. We
recognized that “[Commerce] has a longstanding administrative practice of not
reinvestigating a program determined not to be countervailable unless the petitioner
presents new evidence justifying reconsideration of a prior finding.” Id. We found that
Commerce “has been given great discretion in administering the countervailing duty
laws,” and accordingly that “discretionary authority certainly extends to deciding whether
to reinvestigate a program previously found not to be countervailable in a final agency
determination.” Id. We concluded that the allegedly new evidence did not require
reinvestigation. Id.
Here, as in PPG, we see nothing to convince us that Commerce’s interpretation
of the statute is unreasonable. Accordingly, we defer to Commerce’s interpretation of
section 1675(a) that de novo review of the New Shipper Review is not required for each
POR.
Magnola also contends that Commerce cannot rely on its specificity
determination in the New Shipper Review because that determination was appealed to
a NAFTA panel, and 19 U.S.C. § 1516a(b)(3) precludes courts from giving any res
2007-1099 10
judicata effect to NAFTA panel determinations. 3 Thus, according to Magnola, any
reliance on the earlier countervailability determination violates section 1516a(b)(3).
Commerce, in the 2003 Administrative Review, did not give preclusive effect to
the NAFTA panel decision. Instead, Commerce relied on its own earlier determination
in the New Shipper Review and not the NAFTA panel decision affirming it. We see no
violation of the statute in Commerce’s decision to rely on its original determination in the
New Shipper Review.
II
Magnola next contends that even if Commerce is not required to make a de novo
countervailability determination for each POR, there is new evidence here requiring
Commerce to revisit the original determination, namely evidence of the relative benefit
conferred during the POR. Magnola argues that Commerce was required to address
“whether the amortized amount of MTM reimbursements that it attributed to the 2003
period of review provided a disproportionate benefit to Magnola during that period of
review when compared to all of the program reimbursements received in the same
period of review.” Reply Br. Of Plaintiff-Appellant at 23. Magnola urges that this new
evidence shows the dilution of its share of benefits from the MTM program, since during
the POR the program continued reimbursing participants while Magnola received no
new disbursements. Magnola contends that its share of benefits, while disproportionate
3
Section 1516a(b)(3) provides:
In making a decision in any action brought under subsection (a) of this
section, a court of the United States is not bound by, but may take into
consideration, a final decision of a binational panel or extraordinary
challenge committee convened pursuant to article 1904 of the NAFTA or
of the Agreement.
2007-1099 11
in 1998 and 2000 – the years in which it received reimbursements – was no longer
disproportionate in 2003. It relies on section 1677(5A)(D)(iii) of the statute, which
requires Commerce to “take into account . . . the length of time during which the subsidy
program has been in operation.”
This argument might have some force if Commerce were making a new
countervailing duty determination for each POR, but Commerce in this case is not doing
so. Rather, it is simply amortizing the subsidy found to exist in the earlier period over a
period of fourteen years, one of which was the POR. There is nothing unlawful about
such amortization, which is governed by regulation, 19 C.F.R. § 351.524, and
amortization does not require revisiting the countervailing duty determination made in
the initial proceeding. See Norsk Hydro Canada, Inc. v. United States, 472 F.3d 1347,
1363 (Fed. Cir. 2006) (“[Amortization] simply reflects that a non-recurring subsidy
received in one POR may provide a ‘benefit’ in other PORs.”). The amortization of the
non-recurring subsidy necessarily accounts for the passage of time during the
amortization period and is not inconsistent with the statute. Commerce correctly found
that Magnola had not provided new evidence requiring reopening the specificity
determination.
III
Finally, Magnola contends that even if Commerce was not required to make a de
novo specificity determination, Commerce improperly declined to consider whether the
specificity determination made in the New Shipper Review was clearly erroneous and
should be reexamined. Magnola argues that Commerce’s finding that it “receive[d] a
disproportionately large amount” of the MTM program subsidy was clearly erroneous
2007-1099 12
because it was contrary to this court’s decision in AK Steel Corp. v. United States, 192
F.3d 1367 (Fed. Cir. 1999). There, we held “it was not error for Commerce to rely on
record evidence demonstrating no disproportionality based on the relative percentage
benefit rather than on the absolute benefit conferred on [the exporter].” Id. at 1385.
Here, Commerce made its disproportionality finding based on Magnola’s absolute
share. Magnola also contends that Commerce here failed to explain why the MTM
program was countervailable while other similar programs were held by Commerce not
to be. We express no view on the merits of Magnola’s claim because we conclude that
Commerce was not required to revisit its earlier determination.
Just as section 1675(a) is silent as to whether a de novo determination is
required for each POR, section 1675(a) is also silent as to whether Commerce must
consider in an administrative review whether an earlier countervailing duty
determination was clearly erroneous, and again Commerce’s determination that clear
error review is not required constitutes a reasonable interpretation of the statute.
Because section 1675(a) does not require Commerce to consider whether the
New Shipper Review was clearly erroneous, we must next determine whether anything
in the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. §§ 701-706 (“APA”), 4 compels Commerce
to revisit its earlier determination. In other words, was Commerce’s failure to consider
its earlier determination for clear error arbitrary and capricious? Exactly this question
was addressed by the Supreme Court in Interstate Commerce Commission v.
4
We have consistently found that the APA generally applies to
countervailing duty and antidumping proceedings. See Shinyei Corp. of Am. v. United
States, 355 F.3d 1297, 1309 (Fed. Cir. 2004); SKF USA Inc. v. United States, 254 F.3d
1022, 1028 (Fed. Cir. 2001).
2007-1099 13
Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, 482 U.S. 270 (1987). There, the Court held that
“where a party petitions an agency for reconsideration on the ground of ‘material error,’
i.e., on the same record that was before the agency when it rendered its original
decision, ‘an order which merely denies rehearing of . . . [the prior] order is not itself
reviewable.’” Id. at 280 (internal citation omitted). Such a denial is “committed to
agency discretion by law” within the meaning of the APA, 5 U.S.C. § 701(a)(2). Id. at
282. In Locomotive Engineers, the Court distinguished an agency’s refusal to
reconsider a prior decision based on new evidence or changed circumstances from a
refusal to reconsider based on material error. Id. at 279. “[W]here no new data but only
‘material error’ has been put forward as the basis for reopening, an appeal places
before the courts precisely the same substance that could have been brought there by
appeal from the original order . . . .” Id. Denying judicial review to petitions to
reconsider earlier agency actions based only on error in the original decision prevents
an “agency’s permitting, or [a] litigant’s achieving, perpetual availability of review by the
mere device of filing a suggestion that the agency has made a mistake and should
consider the matter again.” Id. at 281. The case before us is even clearer than
Locomotive Engineers because here, unlike in Locomotive Engineers, the underlying
statute does not provide for reconsideration in cases of “material error.” See id. at 277-
78.
The Supreme Court confirmed the central holding of Locomotive Engineers in
later cases. In Lincoln v. Vigil, the Court cited with approval Locomotive Engineers for
the proposition that section 701(a)(2) precludes judicial review of an agency’s refusal to
grant reconsideration of an action because of error in the original decision. 508 U.S.
2007-1099 14
182, 191 (1993). Similarly, in Your Home Visiting Nurse Services, Inc. v. Shalala, the
Court characterized Locomotive Engineers as standing for the “traditional rule of
administrative law that an agency’s refusal to reopen a closed case is generally
‘”committed to agency discretion by law”’ and therefore exempt from judicial review.”
525 U.S. 449, 457 (1999).
Magnola contends that under Commerce’s interpretation, “once Commerce made
a determination of countervailability, it would forever be insulated from judicial review.”
Brief of Plaintiff-Appellant at 21. That is not correct. If new facts or evidence show that
the original determination was erroneous, it will be revisited. We conclude that
Commerce was not required to determine whether it should reconsider its earlier
specificity determination based on alleged error in the original decision. 5
CONCLUSION
For the foregoing reasons, the decision below is AFFIRMED.
No costs.
5
We note that there is no contention here that Commerce’s stated policy in
the 2003 administrative review (that it will not revisit an earlier finding absent new facts
or evidence) is inconsistent with Commerce’s prior administrative decisions. See, e.g.,
Pure and Alloy Magnesium from Canada: Final Results of the First (1992)
Countervailing Duty Administrative Reviews, 62 Fed. Reg. 13,857 (Mar. 24, 1997).
2007-1099 15