US Appeals CIT Order for IEEPA Tariff Refunds, Seeks to Block CBP Commissioner Testimony
The U.S. on June 2 appealed the Court of International Trade’s April 17 order directing CBP to refund duties imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. It also filed a petition and sought a stay to block a CIT order for CBP Commissioner Rodney Scott to testify before the court on June 9 (V.O.S. Selections v. United States, CIT # 25-00066).
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In its petition for a writ of mandamus filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, the government said CIT Judge Richard Eaton ordered the universal injunctions for all entries subject to IEEPA duties despite the fact that importers hadn’t filed motions for preliminary injunctive relief. The U.S. also argued that the injunctions are “plainly unlawful under Trump v. CASA.”
CIT believed it was exempt from CASA because the court was created "under a different statute and granted exclusive national jurisdiction over particular types of claims,” the U.S. argued. But CIT was "expressly created with ‘all the powers in law and equity of, or as conferred by statute upon, a district court of the United States,’" the U.S. said, and "cannot wield an equitable power to grant universal injunctions that district courts do not possess.”
The government said it will seek a stay from the Federal Circuit to prevent the universal injunctions, “if necessary.”
The focus of the government’s petition for a writ of mandamus was blocking CIT from mandating Scott’s testimony before the court during a hearing scheduled for June 9 (see 2605270062). The government argued that Eaton’s order compelling the testimony of Scott was unlawful and violated precedent set by multiple courts of appeals.
“The CIT’s order far exceeds the recognized bounds of compelled testimony from high-ranking Executive Branch officials -- bounds the CIT nowhere addressed,” the government said, citing the Federal Circuit’s In re United States case.
“Courts, including this Court, have repeatedly made clear that the testimony of a high-ranking official cannot be compelled except in ‘extraordinary circumstances,’ where the official possesses ‘first-hand knowledge’ that cannot be provided by ‘other persons,’ … and that is ‘essential to the case,’” the government added.
The government said federal courts have issued mandamus to block orders compelling the testimony of high-ranking officials in multiple cases, including blocking the compelled testimony of the vice president’s chief of staff, the chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, three directors of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the inspector general of the Railroad Retirement Board, among others.
The government said that “no extraordinary circumstances remotely justify [Scott’s] compelled testimony,” and compelling his testimony would “take time away” from his duties and “‘creates all the risks of disrupting significant ongoing government activities’ that this Court and others have recognized warrant mandamus.’”
“And Commissioner Scott’s broad responsibilities are no less significant than those of many other officials whose testimony other courts of appeals have granted mandamus to block,” the government added.
The government said the trade court failed to explain why “extraordinary circumstances” existed, didn’t “identify any factual question … on which the Commissioner possesses firsthand knowledge not available from others,” and failed to explain why the testimony from alternative witnesses “would be insufficient.”
The government offered the testimony of Susan Thomas, CBP’s executive assistant commissioner for trade, and Brandon Lord, CBP’s executive director of the trade programs directorate, but the government said Eaton denied the motion to substitute Lord and Thomas as witnesses without explanation.
Citing In re United States again, the government said that the court's move in potentially “hectoring the agency head over whatever shortcomings the court perceives” in the IEEPA refunds “underscores the serious ‘separation of powers’ concerns raised by ‘the compelled appearance of a high-ranking officer of the executive branch in a judicial proceeding.’”
The U.S. also said Scott’s testimony “is in no sense ‘essential’” to the case filed by V.O.S. Selections, and the plaintiffs in the case “never sought this testimony as relevant to their claims.”
“Indeed, the CIT has now made explicit that the testimony it seeks has nothing to do with the V.O.S. Selections plaintiffs’ claims, stating in denying the motion to substitute that it sought information about CBP’s intentions regarding ‘small importers’ or others whose duties ‘currently cannot be processed by the CAPE program,’” the government added.