Commerce Dept. postpones antidumping ruling

The U.S. Department of Commerce has postponed by 50 days its preliminary antidumping duty determination on truck and bus tires imported from China, according to a June 2Federal Register notice.

The postponement will move the preliminary ruling to Aug. 26 from the former date of July 7. Commerce originally scheduled the determination to be issued 140 days after the Feb. 18 initiation of the truck/bus tire investigation.

The final ruling will still be 75 days after the preliminary determination, which would move that date to Dec. 11 from Sept. 27.

On May 20, the United Steelworkers union—the original petitioner in the truck/bus tire case—filed a new petition requesting the postponement.

“The petitioner states that a postponement is necessary given a very large number of separate rate applications and the need for additional time to analyze responses,” Commerce said in the June 2 notice. There was no compelling reason to deny the USW’s request for a postponement, it said.

This is the second time the USW has requested a postponement in the Chinese truck/bus tire investigation. On March 31, Commerce granted the union’s request for a postponement of the preliminary determination of countervailing duties in that investigation, moving the date to June 27 from April 25.