Longshoremen’s dispute could boil into disruptive strike next week

A dispute over port worker pay and job protections could snarl commerce at ports up and down the East Coast next week. (Edwin J. Torres/NJ Governor’s Office).

A simmering labor dispute between the International Longshoremen’s Association and ports up and down the East Coast could boil over into a disruptive and economically damaging strike next week.

The union has sought steep wage increases and protections against automation that could cost its members their jobs but has increasingly turned to strike threats as its contract nears expiration on Monday, Sept. 30.

The union blames any potential job action on the United States Maritime Alliance, which represents port employers.

“The blame for a coast-wide strike in a week that will shut down all ports on the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts falls squarely on the shoulders of USMX,” union president Harold Daggett said in a statement earlier this week.

A longshoremen’s strike would have devastating economic effects, causing billions in economic losses and several days’ worth of delays for each day work is stopped.

The United States Maritime Alliance has charged the union rebuffed recent attempts to negotiate a contract and on Thursday filed an unfair labor practice charge before the National Labor Relations Board to force the union back to the bargaining table.

“We remain prepared to bargain at any time, but both sides must come to the table if we are going to reach a deal, and there is no indication that the ILA is interested in negotiating at this time,” the group said in a statement earlier this week.

If no agreement is reached, the union could begin a job action on Tuesday, Oct 1. Such a strike would be the first of its scale on the East Coast in nearly half a century.

President Joe Biden could delay any job action by invoking the Taft-Hartley Act, a federal law that allows presidents to intercede to block strikes that could threaten national security, though administration officials earlier in September told Reuters it was not considering an intervention.

If the administration intercedes and a federal judge grants an injunction, the strike could be delayed by up to 80 days, a timeline that would push any job action past the Nov. 5 election.