Biden administration ‘actively’ working on request for foreign diesel ship to enter port in Puerto Rico

By Maegan Vazquez and Nikki Carvajal, CNN

The Biden administration is under increasing pressure to approve a federal waiver to permit a foreign diesel ship to enter a port in Puerto Rico, but administration officials have emphasized that they need to ensure the move would be legal before they move forward.

The request to waive the Jones Act would allow in a British Petroleum ship loaded with diesel that’s currently being blocked from entering one of Puerto Rico’s ports. The ship would provide a potentially vital source of fuel for the island, which is still struggling to regain power following the devastation of Hurricane Fiona last week.

The Jones Act — also known as the Merchant Marine Act of 1920 — requires all goods ferried between US ports to be carried on ships built, owned and operated by Americans. But those ships are far more expensive to buy and operate than foreign ones, making just about everything in Puerto Rico more expensive.

The Department of Homeland Security is “actively” working on the approval process by waiving the Jones Act, Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Deanne Criswell said on Tuesday. But she also emphasized that the request must meet legal requirements put in place by Congress.

“We are committed to doing everything that we can within our legal authority to support the people of Puerto Rico, and we know that the Jones Act waiver is one of those things,” Criswell said at an afternoon press briefing at the White House. “We have a legal obligation to ensure that each waiver request meets the legal requirements of Congress.”

Criswell said the final determination on waiving the act will be made by DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.

DHS is “actively working on that approval process,” Criswell said.

Criswell could not offer a timetable for a potential decision, but an administration official later told CNN that the waiver request is going through accelerated processing.

“We have improved and accelerated the interagency process for conducting the required case-by-case review of Jones Act waivers requests, especially under exigent circumstances like these,” an official said Wednesday. “The secretary of Homeland Security as well as other agencies involved in the review process are committed to timely review of all such requests, with the objective of providing a response expeditiously.”

Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Pierluisi has asked the DHS secretary to personally intervene on the matter. Eight members of Congress, led by New York Democratic Rep. Nydia Velazquez, issued a letter to Mayorkas calling for a temporary waiver. Republican Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida and Mike Lee of Utah have also called on the federal government to issue a waiver.

But American shipping lines that benefit from the law have fought successfully to keep it in place, because it protects thousands of American maritime jobs. Organizations backing US maritime industry labor interests like the American Maritime Partnership are arguing that there American shipping capacity is sufficient to meet Puerto Rico’s demands.

This wouldn’t be the first disaster-related Jones Act waiver Puerto Rico has received. Then-President Donald Trump issued a waiver after Hurricane Maria hit the island in 2017.

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CNN’s Kaitlan Collins and Chris Isidore contributed to this report.