On August 20, 2021, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) implemented additional sanctions on Russia in response to the state-sponsored poisoning of Russian opposition leader Aleksey Navalny in August 2020. Specifically, OFAC has designating nine Russian individuals and two Russian entities found to be involved in Navalny’s poisoning or…

On August 16, 2021, the U.S. Court of International Trade (CIT) once again issued an order revising certain deadlines originally established in its July 6 decision and order granting the plaintiff group’s motion for a preliminary injunction in the ongoing Section 301 tariff refund litigation involving imports of certain Chinese products. The preliminary injunction suspended…

On August 11, 2021, the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) and the Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued a fact sheet noting existing exemptions and authorizations available for companies, individuals and exporters to provide telecommunications-related goods and services to Cuba. The fact sheet lists OFAC general licenses…

In February 2021, President Joseph Biden’s administration sought a pause in ongoing litigation involving Chinese mobile applications TikTok and WeChat in order to evaluate the record and determine whether there was an actual national security threat as previously determined by former President Donald Trump. On June 9, 2021, President Biden issued a new executive order…

On August 9, 2021, the White House issued a new Executive Order (EO), “Blocking Property of Additional Persons Contributing to the Situation in Belarus,” which expands existing U.S. sanctions against Belarus to target various sectors. The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) also issued a host of new designations to the Specially Designated…

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has issued five Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) relating to its June 23, 2021 Withhold Release Order (WRO) requiring U.S. ports to detain shipments of silica-based products and materials as well as goods derived from those products manufactured by Hoshine Silicon Industry Co., Ltd. and its subsidiaries (“Hoshine”). Hoshine operates…

On August 2, 2021, the plaintiff group in the ongoing Section 301 tariff refund litigation at the U.S. Court of International Trade (CIT) filed a Cross-Motion for Judgment on the Agency Record and a Response to the Government’s Motion to Dismiss. In seeking judgment and asking that the government defendants’ motion be denied, the…

On May 4, 2020, former Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross announced the initiation of a Section 232 investigation into whether certain transformer components used in electrical power grids are imported in quantities that threaten national security. See SmarTrade Update of May 11, 2020. The investigation focused on transformers and transformer components (i.e.,…

On June 2, 2020, former Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross announced the initiation of a Section 232 investigation into whether the quantities or circumstances of imports of vanadium into the United States threaten to impair U.S. national security. This investigation was the result of a petition filed by U.S. producers AMG Vanadium LLC (Cambridge, Ohio)…