American Waterways, Global Volatility: Making the Right Policy Choices
Today’s headlines bring constant news of international shipping hubs across the global supply chain experiencing major volatility and disruption – from Iran sending shockwaves through global energy markets by forcefully obstructing vessel traffic in the Strait of Hormuz; to the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen signaling intent to restart attacks on shipping in the Red Sea; to China detaining Panama-flagged vessels in an escalation of ongoing disputes over the Panama Canal; and beyond.
By contrast, the American tugboat, towboat and barge industry continues to move our nation’s cargo on U.S. domestic waterways, safely, securely, and reliably. Even with the occasional curveball from Mother Nature causing delays in one part of the system or another, dedicated and resilient U.S. mariners continue to deliver without fail.
Domestic maritime’s ability to serve as a beacon of stability despite geopolitical upheaval is not solely attributable to skill, grit, and experience, as critical as those are – it’s also the product of public policies that enable the industry to keep moving, thriving and innovating. But those policies cannot be taken for granted – they represent choices made by policymakers to consciously shape an operational environment that reflects our industry’s fundamental importance to our nation’s economy, supply chain, and national security, and to the everyday lives of Americans. Today, we need policymakers to make the right choices in support of this essential industry, starting with terminating the historically long, overly broad, unnecessary Jones Act waiver currently in effect.
The issuance in March of a 60-day Jones Act waiver, allowing foreign-flagged vessels to move oil, natural gas, coal, and fertilizer between U.S. ports – a waiver already unprecedented in both length and scope and recently extended for an additional 90 days from the May 17 expiration date – has had no impact on the price of gasoline domestically. Meanwhile, the waiver has created serious vulnerabilities.
The waiver applies to domestic markets where no American vessel shortage exists, allowing foreign vessels to navigate our domestic waterways freely, directly undercutting American companies that play by the rules and follow U.S. law. This puts American vessel owners, mariners and shipyards at a disadvantage and undermines our supply chain reliability while making our waterways less safe. As legal observers have noted, a Jones Act waiver is not a waiver of U.S. tax, immigration, labor or environmental laws, but it is unclear how the federal government intends to ensure that foreign vessels using the waiver are fully compliant with applicable laws – a situation that is unfair at best, and profoundly dangerous at worst.
Particularly at a time of heightened risk of terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, the Jones Act serves as a security bulwark on our waterways by guaranteeing that it’s American mariners supporting the Coast Guard’s homeland security mission on our inland rivers, coastal routes, and Great Lakes. The Coast Guard and other federal agencies are simply not resourced to protect against security threats from foreign vessels and crews with unfettered access to U.S. domestic waterways.
Put simply, this Jones Act waiver throws open America’s maritime borders to foreign vessels and crews and puts American workers last.
It’s incompatible with the goal of restoring American maritime dominance and ignores the targeted, case-by-case waiver process provided by current law when genuine transportation needs cannot be met by American vessels. This gut punch to American mariners should be reversed immediately.
Another critical policy choice to be made to keep American commerce flowing is continued investment in the safety and efficiency of our waterways system. This not only means providing robust funding for locks, dams, dredging and Coast Guard buoy tenders to prevent congestion in our rivers and harbors – it also means encouraging sensible permitting reform to enable more efficient infrastructure development; continuously building on the strong cooperative framework between industry, the Coast Guard and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to manage high and low water conditions on our inland river system; establishing coastal navigation safety fairways to ensure safe vessel transits in crowded, multi-use waterways; and ensuring that important Coast Guard services such as mariner credentialing and vessel documentation that keep the Marine Transportation System running are not held hostage to lengthy Department of Homeland Security funding lapses like what we have experienced these past several months.
Alongside modernized physical infrastructure and safe navigation routes, the stability and resilience of our domestic maritime supply chain also depend on a regulatory environment that encourages safety, efficiency, and innovation. To that end, the Coast Guard must prioritize long overdue implementation of regulations required by the Vessel Incidental Discharge Act to finally create uniform standards for vessels in interstate commerce; take a risk-based, practicable approach to implementation of new cybersecurity regulations; and build on positive steps to reform the mariner credentialing process so that our essential workforce does not lose more mariners to frustration with bureaucratic inertia.
The American people have always been able to count on domestic maritime to keep our nation’s commerce moving, including in today’s unpredictable global environment. Now, more than ever, Americans need the Trump Administration and Congress to support the policies that make this vital work possible.