Slip Op. 26-86
UNITED STATES COURT OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE
KEMPER AIP METALS, LLC AND
WAELZHOLZ BRASMETAL LAMINAÇÃO
LTDA.,
Plaintiffs, Before: Timothy M. Reif, Judge
v. Court No. 26-00762
UNITED STATES,
Defendant.
OPINION
[Granting proposed defendant-intervenors’ motions to intervene.]
Dated: August 7, 2026
John Anwesen, Lighthill PC, of Washington, D.C., for plaintiffs Kemper AIP Metals, LLC and Waelzholz Brasmetal Laminação Ltda.
Isabelle Aubrun, Trial Attorney, Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil Division, U.S. Department of Justice, of Washington, D.C., for defendant United States. Of counsel was Brien C. Stonebreaker, Attorney, Office of the Chief Counsel for Trade Enforcement and Compliance, U.S. Department of Commerce, of Washington, D.C.
James E. Ransdell IV, Thomas M. Beline and Margaret E. Monday, Cassidy Levy Kent (USA) LLP, of Washington, D.C., for proposed defendant-intervenor United States Steel Corporation.
Roger B. Schagrin, Jeffrey D. Gerrish and Nicholas C. Phillips, Schagrin Associates, of Washington, D.C., for proposed defendant-intervenors Steel Dynamics, Inc. and the United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, AFL-CIO, CLC.
Alan H. Price, Christopher B. Weld and Stephanie M. Bell, Wiley Rein LLP, of Washington, D.C., for proposed defendant-intervenor Nucor Corporation.
* * *
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Reif, Judge: Before the court are the motions to intervene of proposed defendantintervenors Nucor Corporation (“Nucor”), Steel Dynamics, Inc. (“Steel Dynamics”),
United States Steel Corporation (“U.S. Steel”) and United Steel, Paper and Forestry,
Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International
Union, AFL-CIO, CLC (“USW”) (collectively, “proposed intervenors”). See Partially
Unopposed Mot. to Intervene as a Matter of Right (“U.S. Steel Br”), ECF No. 11; Mot. to
Intervene as Def.-Intervenors (“Steel Dynamics and USW Br.”), ECF No. 15; Mot. to
Intervene as a Matter of Right (“Nucor Br.”), ECF No. 20.
Plaintiffs Kemper AIP Metals, LLC (“Kemper”) and Waelzholz Brasmetal
Laminação Ltda. (“Waelzholz Brasmetal”) oppose the motions on the grounds that
proposed defendant-intervenors “have no constitutional standing” and “do not qualify as
interested parties under 28 U.S.C. § 2631(j)(1)(B).” Opp’n to Mots. to Intervene (“Pls.
Br.”) at 2, ECF No. 26.
For the reasons discussed below, the court grants the motions to intervene.
BACKGROUND
The instant action arises from the affirmative determination of Commerce in the
antidumping duty (“AD”) investigation of certain corrosion-resistant steel products
(“CORE”) from Brazil for the period of investigation (“POI”) July 1, 2023, through June
30, 2024. Certain Corrosion-Resistant Steel Products from Brazil: Final Affirmative
Determination of Sales at Less than Fair Value (“Final Results”), 90 Fed. Reg. 42,219
(Dep’t Commerce Aug. 29, 2025) and accompanying Issues and Decision
Memorandum (“IDM”) (Dep’t of Commerce Aug. 25, 2025).
Court No. 26-00762 Page 3
On September 5, 2024, Commerce received an AD petition filed on behalf of
proposed defendant-intervenors and Wheeling-Nippon Steel, Inc., domestic producers
of CORE. Certain Corrosion-Resistant Steel Products from Brazil: Preliminary
Affirmative Determination of Sales at Less than Fair Value, Postponement of Final
Determination, and Extension of Provisional Measures (“Preliminary Results”), 90 Fed.
Reg. 15,333 (Dep’t of Commerce Apr. 10, 2025) and accompanying Preliminary
Decision Memorandum (“PDM”) at 1 (Dep’t of Commerce Apr. 3, 2025).
On April 10, 2025, Commerce issued the Preliminary Results and invited
comments from interested parties. Preliminary Results, 90 Fed. Reg. at 15,334. On
August 29, 2025, Commerce issued the Final Results. 90 Fed. Reg. 42,219.
On November 28, 2025, the U.S. International Trade Commission issued its final
affirmative injury determination and published its views on the same. See CorrosionResistant Steel Products from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, Netherlands, South
Africa, Taiwan, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, and Vietnam; Determinations, 90 Fed.
Reg. 55,320 (Dec. 2, 2025); see also Corrosion-Resistant Steel Products from Australia,
Brazil, Canada, Mexico, Netherlands, South Africa, Taiwan, Türkiye, United Arab
Emirates, and Vietnam, USITC Pub. 5678, Inv. Nos. 701-TA-733-736 and 731-TA-1702-1711 (Nov. 2025).
On December 19, 2025, Commerce issued the final AD order and assessed
duties on relevant entries of CORE. See Corrosion-Resistant Steel Products from
Brazil and Mexico: Amended Final Antidumping Duty Determination; CorrosionResistant Steel Products from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, the Netherlands,
South Africa, Taiwan, the Republic of Türkiye, the United Arab Emirates, and the Court No. 26-00762 Page 4
Socialist Republic of Vietnam: Antidumping Duty Orders, 90 Fed. Reg. 59,494 (Dep’t of
Commerce Dec. 19, 2025).
On February 19, 2026, plaintiffs filed their complaint in the instant action.
Compl., ECF No. 7.
On March 16 and 20, 2026, proposed intervenors filed the instant motions. See
U.S. Steel Br.; Steel Dynamics and USW Br.; Nucor Br.
JURISDICTION
28 U.S.C. § 1581(c) grants to this Court “exclusive jurisdiction of any civil action
commenced under section 516A or 517 of the Tariff Act of 1930.” Section 516A of the
Tariff Act of 1930 governs judicial review of determinations of Commerce in AD and
CVD proceedings. 1 See 19 U.S.C. § 1516a.
DISCUSSION
I. Constitutional standing
The court concludes that proposed intervenors have constitutional standing.
Plaintiffs argue that proposed intervenors “have no constitutional standing”
because “[t]hey neither assert an injury in fact traceable to the outcome of this litigation
nor claim piggyback standing by aligning themselves with the relief the United States
seeks.” Pls. Br. at 2.
In response, proposed intervenors argue that “Article III poses no obstacle where
proposed defendant-intervenors seek the same relief as the United States.” Resp. to
Opp’n to Mot. to Intervene (“Intervenors Br.”) at 7, ECF No. 28. Proposed intervenors
1 Further citations to the Tariff Act of 1930, as amended, are to the relevant portions of
Title 19 of the U.S. Code, 2018 edition.
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submit that they “do not seek to broaden the case, introduce new claims, or obtain any
relief different from that sought by the United States.” Id. at 8. Rather, the “only relief
Proposed Defendant-Intervenors seek is affirmance of [the] final determination” of
Commerce. Id.
The Supreme Court has stated that “[u]nder our precedents, at least one party
must demonstrate Article III standing for each claim for relief.” Little Sisters of the Poor
Saints Peter and Paul Home v. Pa., 591 U.S. 657, 674 n.6 (2020). Accordingly, “an
intervenor of right must have Article III standing in order to pursue relief that is different
from that which is sought by a party with standing.” Town of Chester v. Laroe Ests.,
Inc., 581 U.S. 433, 440 (2017) (emphasis supplied).
Put differently, “[w]here a putative intervenor seeks only the same relief as an
existing party to the litigation, the proposed intervenor may ‘piggyback’ on the existing
party’s standing.” HiSteel Co. v. United States, 46 CIT __, __, 592 F. Supp. 3d 1339,
1342 (2022) (citing Cal. Steel Indus., Inc. v. United States, 48 F.4th 1336, 1343 (Fed.
Cir. 2022)). And the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has clarified that for
defendant-intervenors in a trade action, piggyback standing is established when “the
proposed intervenors’ requested relief is largely identical to the government’s prayer for
relief.” Cal. Steel Indus., 48 F.4th at 1343.
Plaintiffs do not dispute that proposed intervenors request only that the court
sustain the Final Results. See Pls. Br. Rather, the crux of plaintiffs’ argument is that
proposed intervenors neglected to argue explicitly that they possess constitutional
standing. See id. at 3-4. Given that the “only relief Proposed Defendant-Intervenors
seek is affirmance of [the] final determination,” Intervenors Br. at 8, the court concludes Court No. 26-00762 Page 6
that proposed intervenors have established implicitly constitutional standing. Plaintiffs
have failed to support their contention that constitutional standing must be argued and
established explicitly. See Pls. Br.
II. Intervention as a matter of right
The court concludes that proposed intervenors may intervene as a matter of
right.
Pursuant to U.S. Court of International Trade Rule 24(a), “[o]n timely motion, the
court must permit anyone to intervene who . . . is given an unconditional right to
intervene by a federal statute.”
28 U.S.C. § 2631(j)(1) provides that
Any person who would be adversely affected or aggrieved by a decision in
a civil action pending in the Court of International Trade may, by leave of
court, intervene in such action, except that . . . in a civil action under section
516A of the Tariff Act of 1930, only an interested party who was a party to
the proceeding in connection with which the matter arose may intervene,
and such person may intervene as a matter of right.
Id. (emphases supplied).
In the instant case, all proposed intervenors are “interested part[ies] who
[were parties] to the proceeding in connection with which the matter arose” such
that they all may intervene as a matter of right.
28 U.S.C. § 2631(k) specifies that “interested party” has the meaning
given in 19 U.S.C. § 1677(9), which includes
(C) a manufacturer, producer, or wholesaler in the United States of a
domestic like product, [and]
Court No. 26-00762 Page 7
(D) a certified union or recognized union or group of workers which is
representative of an industry engaged in the manufacture, production, or
wholesale in the United States of a domestic like product.
The court concludes that Nucor, Steel Dynamics and U.S. Steel are
“manufacturer[s] . . . in the United States of a domestic like product” in the instant
action.
It is undisputed that all three are manufacturers of subject merchandise.
See Pls. Br. at 1; Intervenors Br. at 2-3. 19 U.S.C. § 1677(10) defines “domestic
like product” as “a product which is like, or in the absence of like, most similar in
characteristics and uses with, the article subject to an investigation.” As
manufacturers of the “article subject to [the] investigation” itself, Nucor, Steel
Dynamics and U.S. Steel manufacture “a domestic like product” and are
therefore “interested parties.” Cf. Hitachi Metals, Ltd. v. United States, 949 F.3d
710, 717 (Fed. Cir. 2020) (“Hitachi cites no authority that precludes the
Commission from determining that the domestic like product and the subject
merchandise are coextensive.”).
The same logic applies to USW, which is undisputedly “a certified union or
recognized union . . . of workers which is representative of an industry engaged
in the manufacture . . . of a domestic like product.” 19 U.S.C. § 1677(9)(D); see
Pls. Br. at 1-2. 2
2 Plaintiffs argue that:
“The United Steelworkers represents a small portion of the
workforce. Union membership across private-sector manufacturing, like the brasscoated steel producers that are absent from this case, tends to be lower, with an overall rate of around 6.9% for private-sector industries in the United States.” Pls. Br. at 1-2. This argument is not relevant to the statute. See 19 U.S.C. § 1677(9)(D); see also H.R. Doc. No. 103-316, at 862 (1994) (“The Administration intends that labor have equal voice with management in supporting or opposing the initiation of an investigation.”). Court No. 26-00762 Page 8
Moreover, the proposed intervenors were “part[ies] to the proceeding in
connection with which the matter arose” because all four were petitioners in the
underlying investigation. 28 U.S.C. § 2631(j)(1); PDM at 1; see Laclede Steel
Co. v. United States, No. 96-1029, 1996 WL 384010, at *2 (Fed. Cir. July 8,
1996).
Proposed intervenors add that “[p]laintiffs’ theory would turn intervention
into a vehicle for relitigating the merits of the Commerce’s [sic] decision under the
guise of standing and would threaten to exclude the very parties Congress
expressly authorized to participate in § 1516a actions.” Intervenors Br. at 2.
Plaintiffs insist nonetheless that proposed intervenors should not be permitted to
intervene because proposed intervenors “do not produce or sell brass-coated
steel, nor do they understand the technical aspects of the product.” 3 Pls. Br. at 6.
Plaintiffs argue also that proposed intervenors’ purported lack of understanding
was “responsible” for the scope language in the Final Results that plaintiffs
challenge in this action. 4 Id. at 7.
Both arguments are premature. The intervention inquiry is predicated on
the nexus of the parties to the subject merchandise and their participation in the
3 Waelzholz Brasmetal produces brass-coated steel strip and Kemper imports brasscoated steel strip. See Compl. ¶¶ 1-2.
4 That scope language provides “certain flat-rolled steel products, either clad, plated, or
coated with corrosion-resistant metals such as zinc, aluminum, or zinc-, aluminum-, nickel- or iron-based alloys, whether or not corrugated or painted, varnished, laminated, or coated with plastics or other non-metallic substances in addition to the metallic coating.” See Final Results, 90 Fed. Reg. at 42,222 (emphasis supplied). The term “such as” indicates a non-exhaustive list. See Such As, Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/such%20as (last visited July 30, 2026) (“used to introduce an example or series of examples”).
Court No. 26-00762 Page 9
underlying proceeding. See 28 U.S.C. § 2631(j)(1). It would be inappropriate at
this stage for the court to look beyond these questions at the legal issues that
form the substance of plaintiffs’ action. 5 See Compl. ¶¶ 18-21.
The decision to allow intervention here does not have any impact on the
subsequent adjudication of plaintiffs’ claims. Just as the court is not prepared at
this time to deny intervention on the grounds proffered by plaintiffs as that would
prejudge factual and legal issues that go to the merits of plaintiffs’ claims, so the
court’s ruling does not prejudge issues in favor of intervenors. Any attempt to
conflate intervention and the merits constitutes an erroneous reading of the
statute and the rules of this Court.
For these reasons, the court concludes that proposed intervenors “may
intervene as a matter of right.” 28 U.S.C. § 2631(j)(1).
CONCLUSION
For the reasons discussed above, proposed intervenors’ motions to intervene are
hereby GRANTED.
SO ORDERED.
5 The court underscores that this matter represents an attempt by plaintiffs to litigate the
substance of the dispute in the guise of opposing a motion to intervene. In this way, plaintiffs’ action constitutes both a misconstrual and a misuse of the process under the Rules of the Court. Such a misuse causes the Court, the government and other parties to expend resources unnecessarily. Parties are reminded that they are Officers of the Court and are responsible, consistent with ethical rules, to act as such. Opposing an intervention motion on grounds that self-evidently go to the merits of a matter represents a failure to act as an Officer of the Court. The court encourages parties in the future to avoid this wasteful use of its and others’ finite resources. Court No. 26-00762 Page 10
/s/ Timothy M. Reif
Timothy M. Reif, Judge
Dated: August 7, 2026
New York, New York