TEXAS — According to the Associated Press, about 40% of all shipping containers brought to the U.S. come through the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports.

What You Need To Know

  • Roughly 40% of shipping containers brought to the U.S. comes through the Los Angeles and Long Beach ports, and they remain backed up

  • The backup has interrupted the global supply chain, causing some products to not be available on shelves in the U.S. and in some instances driving prices up

  • Gov. Greg Abbott in a tweet and interview suggested Texas' ports are available and could help to remedy the supply chain issue

  • Texas is home to five ports that rank in the top 20 in the U.S. for total tonnage

A logjam of ships at those ports has interrupted the global supply chain and in October prompted the Biden administration to allow the port complex to operate 24 hours a day in order to get goods unloaded and to customers.

Gov. Greg Abbott, tweeting out an ad targeting California, is encouraging shippers to choose Texas ports instead.

“Texas ports are open & ready to help fix America's supply chain backlog. We can get goods out faster & at a lower cost than California due to our centralized location. Choose Texas,” Abbott wrote.

According to the Texas Department of Transportation, the Lone Star State in 2018 ranked second in the nation for total waterborne tonnage handled and five of its ports are ranked in the top 20 U.S. ports by total tonnage. They are:

  • Port Houston
  • Port of Beaumont
  • Port of Corpus Christi
  • Port of Texas City
  • Port of Port Arthur

California Gov. Gavin Newsom in October issued an executive order that aims to ease the backlog. He directed California government agencies to look for state-owned properties that could temporarily store goods coming into the ports. Newsom, a Democrat, asked the state’s Department of General Services to review potential sites by Dec. 15.

"The rules and regulations that exist in California — that's one reason why you see the almost 100-day delay in ships being able to go to port and unload and get those goods across the United States of America, causing the problems that we see in the supply chain,” Abbot said in an interview with Fox Business. “In just two weeks, those same ships could go through the Panama Canal and go to the Houston Port and Freeport Port in the state of Texas, unload and be back in Asia before they would even be unloading in California.” 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.