The Jones Act exemption, according to Cato, opened routes the protected fleet did not cover

On July 29, 2026, Sin Comillas publishes that on March 17, 2026 the U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued a Jones Act waiver that allows foreign-flag vessels to transport petroleum and gasoline between U.S. ports, Puerto Rico included. The waiver was extended through August 16 and, according to a Cato Institute report, has had logistical effects by establishing new routes. Cato holds that the suspension for a limited number of energy and fertilizer shipments increased internal volume and activated routes the national fleet had not covered — in some cases could not cover for lack of ships — in 20 years of data.

Two foreign-flag tankers transported fuel from Bayonne, New Jersey, to Puerto Rico, the first of that type in 20 years of National Ballast Information Clearinghouse records. In those 20 years only five Jones Act-compliant tanker trips from New Jersey to Puerto Rico were recorded, four of them barges. The only transfer by a Jones-compliant self-propelled tanker was in June 2016. In June, a Portuguese-flag tanker carried fertilizers from San Juan to Point Comfort, Texas. Puerto Rico, Cato notes, is not an important bulk-energy supplier to the mainland, so those tankers likely traveled empty. NBIC records no prior Jones trips on that route.

Two foreign-flag liquefied-gas vessels delivered propane to Puerto Rico by the Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania, route, an unrecorded route, which Cato reads as a lack of Jones ships capable of that service. The report says the exemption, though limited in time and products, boosted internal trade and questions that the Jones Act suppresses viable exchanges. Without congressional action to make it permanent and broad, it adds, it will not be fully known. An additional analysis is truncated on the page.

This note does not turn Cato into a legislature or the waiver into a freight cut for the consumer. The routes, the flags, and the DHS dates stand. On July 23, Sin Comillas covered Popular's earnings. Bank and merchant marine are not averaged.

The reader who wants the Cato report has the Sin Comillas URL at the foot. This is not original reporting.

Source: Sin Comillas. https://sincomillas.com/la-exencion-de-la-ley-jones-abrio-nuevas-rutas-comerciales/