Furniture Brands sues to get antidumping duties

Thomas Russell — Furniture Today,
HIGH POINT — Furniture Brands International has filed a

lawsuit to claim some of the antidumping monies collected by the U.S. government on Chinese-made wood bedroom furniture.
In a suit filed Jan. 23, 2017 in the U.S. Court of International Trade, Furniture Brands claims that it is owed $6.3 million of the funds collected between June 2004 and Dec. 31, 2016 by U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The money is part of the $31.8 million the U.S. government said was available on duties collected between June 2004 and Dec. 31, 2016.
The government has distributed $21.8 million of those funds to petitioners supporting the original antidumping investigation in 2003 and 2004. Officials said they were withholding the remaining $9.9 million because of pending litigation involving a company in the crayfish industry, whose outcome may have implications for the distribution of other antidumping duties.
The filing was part of a packet of information presented during a discussion of antidumping issues here Wednesday, sponsored by the American Home Furnishings Alliance. The session covered some historical perspective on the issue and the types of products included in the antidumping ruling.
The original petition for an antidumping investigation on wood bedroom furniture was filed on behalf of the American Furniture Manufacturers Committee for Legal Trade.
Furniture Brands was not among the group of petitioning companies, it claims it is owed monies because it is among the domestic producers hurt by furniture imports. At the time of the filing, it claimed it had seven U.S. wood bedroom factories, making it one of the largest domestic manufacturers of wood bedroom furniture. 
John Bassett, who chairs the Legal Trade group and is chairman of manufacturer Vaughan-Bassett Furniture, said in a statement, “We had a right, when we saw what was happening to our industry and our workers, to request an investigation. They have a right, if they believe they are legally owed something, to file a lawsuit.”