President-elect Donald Trump gave dockworkers a boost in contract negotiations by seemingly endorsing their union’s demand to stop automation, lowering the odds of an economically damaging strike when the current contract expires in mid-January.
East and Gulf Coast workers with the International Longshoremen’s Association have been struggling with negotiations with the U.S. Maritime Alliance for months. The union is demanding pay boosts and a total ban on the automation of cranes, gates, and container movements at the ports. Trump now appears to be siding with the union ahead of the Jan. 15 deadline.
“There has been a lot of discussion having to do with ‘automation’ on United States docks,” Trump said on social media. “I’ve studied automation, and know just about everything there is to know about it. The amount of money saved is nowhere near the distress, hurt, and harm it causes for American Workers, in this case, our Longshoremen.”
Trump also noted that he met with ILA President Harold Daggett and the union’s executive vice president, Dennis Daggett. Trump said foreign companies have “made a fortune” by accessing U.S. markets.
“They’ve got record profits, and I’d rather these foreign companies spend it on the great men and women on our docks, than machinery, which is expensive, and which will constantly have to be replaced,” Trump continued. “In the end, there’s no gain for them, and I hope that they will understand how important an issue this is for me.”
Clifford Winston, a senior economic studies fellow at the Brookings Institution, told the Washington Examiner that Trump’s apparent support for the union’s demand could only be seen as a shot in the arm for the ILA, which could strike when its current contract expires on Jan. 15.
“Trump threatens people, he lives for that, he lives to have influence,” Winston said. “He’s capable of stepping in there and tilting the scales.”
Winston said Trump could threaten management by, for instance, threatening to gut the Jones Act, a law that benefits the U.S. shipping industry by requiring that vessels that move goods between U.S. ports be built, owned, and crewed by Americans.
“I’ll do many things that you won’t like that can hurt you financially,” Winston said, channeling the president-elect.
It isn’t clear how directly involved in the negotiations Trump may get. However, Trump will assume the presidency just five days after the union’s contract is set to expire, and the prospect of inheriting a strike that would snarl supply chains right out of the gate could put pressure on him to act.
A strike would be damaging, given how many ports and workers are involved. A work stoppage would be a logistical nightmare for companies that rely on shipments coming into the East Coast. It would hurt production at companies throughout the country, driving up prices.
A strike might also have a ripple effect on ports on the West Coast, given that shippers have already started to shift goods to West Coast ports precisely because of the possibility of a massive East Coast stoppage.
In October, dockworkers with the union went on strike for a short period of time before negotiations were extended to the new Jan. 15 date. An analysis at the time by Mirko Woitzik, global director of intelligence for Everstream Analytics, found that a three-day strike would create backlogs that would take between 21 and 25 days to resolve.
Sean Higgins, a labor expert at the libertarian Competitive Enterprise Institute, told the Washington Examiner that Trump’s decision to weigh in on the disagreement in favor of the union can be seen as a signal that he won’t intervene in a strike or use his powers to quash one.
As president, he has the power to intervene under the Taft-Hartley Act, which amended the National Labor Relations Act to give the executive authority to manage strikes in cases of national emergency.
If Trump did intervene, it would impose an 80-day cooling-off period under Taft-Hartley. During that period, a strike would be averted, and longshoremen would return to work while negotiations continued.
“He’s gonna put the pressure on the ports themselves to cave to the union’s demands,” Higgins said. He said the most likely scenario is the ports will agree to essentially maintain the status quo, in which they will agree not to lay people off because of automation.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
The U.S. Maritime Alliance is going to do what is best for business, Peter Loge, director of the George Washington University School of Media & Public Affairs, told the Washington Examiner. However, having Trump weigh-in is still a boost for the union.
“Obviously, you would rather have the president of the United States supporting you than opposing you,” Loge said. “But, ultimately, economics is economics. The bottom line is the bottom line.”
