John McCain calls Donald Trump’s bluff on his Puerto Rico corruption
Yesterday, Palmer Report wrote that Donald Trump’s hesitation to temporarily suspend the Jones Act in order to help with Puerto Rico relief was likely rooted in the shipping industry’s fear that the suspension might become permanent (link). The Jones Act has unintentionally created a corrupt racket for certain shipping companies, and Trump was all too happy to be their puppet. But now John McCain is calling Trump’s bluff.
McCain rather loudly called for the the Jones Act to be suspended. Facing mounting public pressure, Trump gave in to McCain’s demand. But that merely gave McCain an opening to try to get the Jones Act permanently repealed. McCain tweeted “Trump admin has finally waived Jones Act for Puerto Rico. Now Congress must repeal this law to aid long-term recovery.” Then later in the day he added “Intro’d bill with Senator Mike Lee today to permanently exempt #PuertoRico from the #JonesAct & aid long-term recovery.”
This puts Trump in a very difficult situation when it comes to his desire to side with the greedy shipping companies in question. They want the law to continue to wrongly force Puerto Ricans to pay needless shipping surcharges for everything that’s shipped to and from the United States mainland. But now that two Republican Senators are pushing legislation to repeal the Jones Act permanently, which will likely be embraced by the Democrats in Congress, Trump can’t win.
If and when the Jones Act repeal lands on Donald Trump’s desk. He faces a no-win situation. If he signs it, he’ll alienate his cronies in the shipping industry, who are clearly holding something over his head. If he vetoes it, he’ll get criticized by both parties for screwing Puerto Rico at a time when it’s in desperate need of help. John McCain has once again managed to call Trump’s bluff.
