June 26, 2026
On behalf of the undersigned organizations, we write in opposition to Amendment #599, The American Supply Chain Sovereignty Initiative, offered by Rep. Sam Graves (R-MO), in the House version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). We represent a coalition of unions across the supply chain committed to strengthening our nation’s economy and security, investing in our supply chain to ensure the efficient movement of goods, and protecting the workers who keep our goods moving throughout our economy.
We share Congress’s objective of reducing reliance on foreign adversaries, including Chinese logistics platform LOGINK, and strengthening the security and resilience of the U.S. supply chain. However, the proposal fails to deliver meaningful solutions that make our supply chain more secure, resilient or defensible against foreign adversaries. Further, this proposal steps on collective bargaining rights, governance, transparency, and necessary labor protections, and incentivizes participants to provide data that could be used to monitor, track, and evaluate worker performance along the supply chain.
1. Improving the vulnerabilities along America’s supply chain must start by investing in our infrastructure and American workers.
While we support efforts to reduce reliance on Chinese logistics platforms and address vulnerabilities in our supply chain, replacing one digital platform with another is not a substitute for investing in physical infrastructure, modern equipment, and the skilled workforce necessary to move freight safely and efficiently.
Congress is right to be concerned about platforms like LOGINK. Unfortunately, consolidating a dispersed ecosystem of logistics data into one federal architecture could be counterproductive and significantly increase vulnerability to compromise and attack. While greater compartmentalization offers greater security, a brand-new federally run dashboard built to a 12-month deployment deadline is certain to have unknown vulnerabilities, immature incident-response procedures, and unproven access controls. Linking every Customs Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (CTPAT) participant will only widen the blast radius.
The Chinese state-owned crane manufacturer ZPMC, which builds nearly 80 percent of the ship-to-shore cranes operating at U.S. ports, has been flagged by congressional investigators for undocumented remote-access components — but a new federal data-sharing dashboard does not retrofit a single insecure crane or replace a single compromised modem. Hardening our physical infrastructure against these documented threats requires sustained capital investment, not a parallel data platform layered on top of the equipment that remains vulnerable.
Increased data sharing does not make our supply chain more secure or efficient and does nothing to end freight congestion, equipment shortages, infrastructure constraints, or labor shortages. Rather, it infringes on collective bargaining and injects potentially new conflicts into the system.
In order to improve the vulnerabilities along America’s supply chain, we must have meaningful investments in physical infrastructure and workforce capacity.
2. Data collection alone does not improve supply chain security or transparency.
While the amendment purports to build on the success of the FLOW program, after four years of operation and despite the contributions of over 85 members, we are unaware of any report, performance evaluation, or academic study that quantifies FLOW’s improvement of any supply chain metric — congestion, cost, on-time performance, or consumer prices.
The amendment’s emphasis on expanded data collection is flawed for both commercial and security reasons. Third-party logistics providers (3PLs), non-vessel-operating common carriers (NVOCCs), and ocean carriers compete for the same cargo. As a result, a voluntary data collection regime could benefit some market participants, while exposing commercially sensitive information for others. China, for example, has restricted public access to shipping location data, pointing to national security concerns.
Additionally, this proposal would produce only a partial view of freight movement along all modes of the supply chain. If the objective is to improve supply chain performance by identifying bottlenecks and inefficiencies, relying on incomplete datasets risks generating inaccurate conclusions and ineffective policy responses.
While the potential benefits of aggregating data may be broad and theoretical, the drawbacks are always concrete and specific. Any workable solution must safeguard commercially sensitive information, respect workers’ rights, and safeguard the interests of all participants along the supply chain.
3. Workforce protections need to be strengthened to ensure collective bargaining rights are protected.
Although the amendment includes specific carveouts for workforce protections, the language falls short on ensuring that job functions, job classifications, and certain protections under existing collective bargaining agreements are maintained. Further, programs that track and collect asset-specific data can be used to track worker-specific performance data along the supply chain. Data collection cannot be weaponized to create production quotas or undermine the collective bargaining process.
Collective bargaining rights and jurisdiction must be honored and respected – data collection and the use of data should not circumvent or disrupt existing collective bargaining agreements.
4. Congress should strengthen not weaken existing labor protections.
While we appreciate that the current amendment includes labor protections not reflected in earlier drafts, implementation of any new logistics platform shouldn’t determine how future operational changes affect existing CBAs or workers’ rights under existing labor law.
If we are to discuss meaningful change and solutions to fix the longstanding bottlenecks and vulnerabilities along the supply chain, we encourage the Department of Transportation and Congress to go back to the drawing board with impacted stakeholders – specifically labor – to provide solutions that work for everyone.
For these reasons, we respectfully ask that you oppose the Graves Amendment #599: The American Supply Chain Sovereignty Initiative.
Sincerely,
International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA)
International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU)
International Organization of Masters, Mates and Pilots (MM&P)
Marine Engineers’ Beneficial Association (MEBA)
Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO (TTD)