Washington DC— The Power 4 Puerto Rico Coalition demands that President Biden immediately waive the unfair and arbitrary Jones Act imposition on Puerto Rico. We add our voices to the request made last week to Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas by Rep. Nydia Velázquez and other Members of Congress. We urge Rep. Bennie Thompson, as chair of the House Homeland Security Committee, to also pressure for this waiver that President Biden’s administration should issue today.
“As reported yesterday, a ship with diesel fuel needed to run generators is stationed off the southern coast of Puerto Rico but it cannot dock because of the restrictions imposed under the Merchant Marine Act, also known as the Jones Act. For the last century, this antiquated law has mandated that only US-flagged, built, owned and crewed vessels can take goods from one US port to another. This makes the cost of shipping basic goods to Puerto Rico higher, an expense that is passed on to Puerto Rican consumers—to the tune of $1.5 billion annually—and it sustains a corporate shipping duopoly. In an emergency, the Jones Act jeopardizes the security of Puerto Ricans, as we saw in the days after Hurricane Maria, when the delivery of supplies was also stalled because of this unjust measure. At the time, and only under pressure, President Trump issued merely a 10-day waiver.
“It’s an outrage that lessons remained unlearned from the thousands of deaths after Hurricane Maria and that the voices of Puerto Ricans from the archipelago and Diaspora are unheard on discriminatory policies like the Jones Act. For years, the permanent waiver of the Jones Act has been included in Power 4 Puerto Rico’s policy platform, supported by more than 60 national and local partner organizations. The Jones Act is an economic yoke and a risk to the lives of Puerto Ricans. The time to end its imposition on Puerto Rico and the US colony of Guahån (Guam) was yesterday.”
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