Jones Act Petition

I am a Galveston, Texas, resident currently preparing to take the Tankship Dangerous Liquids (DL) Cargo Course for my Tank Vessel-PIC endorsement and STCW Basic Safety Training this fall. The Jones Act waiver issued in March 2026 is not an abstraction to me. It is a direct threat to the career path I am building and to the Gulf Coast maritime community I intend to serve.

I want to be clear about what I am opposing. The Strait of Hormuz disruption was real. Emergency waiver authority exists for exactly that reason. What cannot be justified is a 659-category blanket waiver covering industrial materials with no apparent connection to a Persian Gulf energy disruption, extended through mid-August 2026 with no public, category-by-category accounting submitted to the congressional subcommittee that holds jurisdiction over this law.

Your readers move cargo through the inland waterways and Gulf corridor every day. Many of the products covered by this waiver move on your readers’ routes — now potentially on foreign-flagged tonnage that has no business in domestic trades under normal circumstances.

I have launched a citizen petition demanding subcommittee oversight, a line-by-line public justification for the waiver’s scope and congressional opposition to the Open America’s Waters Act before it advances further.

I am asking your readers to sign and share it: change.org/SaveJonesAct

Marcus Bellamy

Galveston, Texas