President Trump plans to revive the U.S. maritime ship building industry, including levying tariffs and fees on Chinese ships entering American ports. Now Congress must pass the SHIPS Act, which will increase our ship building capacity and hopefully the size of our merchant marine. It could also provide economies of scale and expertise to rebuild our Navy.

Since WWII the U.S. has had a steady decline in U.S. flagged merchant ships from about 50% of the world's cargo shipping to about 1% today. Our merchant marine has less than 10,000 mariners compared to 50,000 in 1960. Our Navy is hard pressed to find commercial ships to support its operations.

China leads the world in commercial shipping and ship building. It has 5,500 ships in maritime trade compared to 80 for the U.S. China, an economic and military adversary, is a big user of the Panama Canal, and this is why President Trump wants to exert pressure on Panama to have Chinese companies relinquish ownership of Panama Canal port facilities.

Approximately 90% of the world's goods are transported by ships. We must increase U.S. flagged ships to compete with China and other countries, and for our national security.