Trump’s Tariffs Will Stifle Shipping Demand at Port of Oakland, Officials Warn

Shipping demand is falling at the Port of Oakland because of the Trump administration’s tariffs, according to local officials.

At a roundtable discussion on Thursday, labor leaders, shipping officials and local business representatives warned that a trade war could deal a significant blow to the port.

Port officials said container cargo could fall 10% due to U.S. tariffs on foreign goods and the retaliatory tariffs other countries are imposing on American products, but they noted that is a conservative estimate.

“This is a crisis,” said Rep. Lateefah Simon, who represents part of the East Bay, including Oakland. “We want a resolution. Tariffs are not always bad, but a tariff war is a disaster for the United States economy and for the global economy.”

Port Executive Director Kristi McKenney, who led the roundtable with Simon, said she is particularly concerned about blank sailings, when ships cancel particular port stops or even entire voyages, often because of lower demand.

Those canceled incoming voyages also hinder exporting efforts because incoming shipping containers are often emptied to make room for outgoing goods, McKenney said. That could have a significant effect on American produce, dairy and other goods that flow out of Oakland, which is the country’s largest refrigerated port, she said.

Mike Jacob, president of the Pacific Merchant Shipping Association, an organization that represents marine terminal owners and operators along the West Coast, said bookings fell dramatically after President Trump first announced sweeping tariffs on nearly all U.S. trading partners earlier this month, and he’s already seeing canceled voyages from Asia as a result.

“It’s almost the exact same thing we saw at the beginning of the pandemic. We had a significant reduction in total throughput,” Jacob said. “We end up having fewer ships that are coming through, we have fewer longshoremen that are working, fewer truckers that are working, fewer warehousemen that are working.”

Goods imported from China, a major source of trading for the Oakland port, are now facing a 145% tariff, but the import tax policy has been surrounded by uncertainty. Just days after initially announcing his so-called reciprocal tariffs on dozens of countries, Trump declared a 90-day pause for most countries, with China excluded.

Jacob said the pause will likely lead to a short spike in trade, with businesses hoping to sell or buy large quantities of international goods before the tariffs are reimposed, followed by a drop-off once the pause ends.

And while Trump has said he’s negotiating with China over the tariffs, the Chinese government and U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said those talks have not yet started, the Associated Press reported Friday.

The far-reaching nature of the tariffs — and the confusion surrounding them — is vastly different from the import taxes Trump imposed during his first term, according to Jacob, who described the earlier tariffs as being levied on specific commodities in specific countries.

“That’s not what’s happening now, right? We had these sweeping, across-the-board tariffs that raised a lot of eyebrows, not just about the rates, which were exorbitant, but also about the method and the manner in which they happen,” Jacob said. “No one knows what the ultimate policy goal of those things were.”

In Oakland, Simon warned that “there’s a real potentiality of workers losing their jobs.”

“Listen, if there were no tariffs, Oakland would be in an emergency,” she said. “Now, we’re in ICU … we have to convince businesses to stay here.”

Stephanie Tran, president of the Oakland Chinatown Chamber of Commerce, expressed concern for the effect on small, mom-and-pop businesses, which will likely have to absorb the additional costs, raise prices or pull certain items from shelves.

“It’s very important at this time that the community continues to support small businesses like all the restaurants and grocery stores in Oakland Chinatown,” Tran said.

Simon called the president’s tariffs a “no-win situation” and criticized his claim that tariffs will encourage businesses to move manufacturing operations stateside.

“We all agree, we want manufacturing jobs here in the United States. Do we have infrastructure to create that? Was there an articulated plan to build infrastructure in the United States to bring back manufacturing jobs? Absolutely not,” Simon said.

Other attendees at the roundtable discussion echoed that sentiment.

“If tariffs are used in a wise way, in a way that’s tied together with the development of local manufacturing, it can be a good thing,” said Andreas Cluver, vice president of the Oakland Board of Port Commissioners. “But these kind of willy-nilly tariffs that are put in place for political reasons, for patronage reasons, are having a devastating impact on working people.”