The Washington Post’s Juliet Eilperin and Glenn Kessler report that it took over a month from the time the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded before the Obama administration began accepting offers of assistance from foreign nations. On May 19th State Department spokesman Gordon Duguid told reporters:

We are keeping an eye on what supplies we do need. And as we see that our supplies are running low, it may be at that point in time to accept offers from particular governments.

But some time in late May the Obama administration changed course and began accepting help from Mexico and the Netherlands. Why the change? And why the slow response? Eilperin and Kessler do report:

In other cases, domestic politics are at play. … Garret Graves, who chairs Louisiana’s Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, wrote in an e-mail that state officials “have made it clear to our contractors from the beginning that we want to use American dredges to complete this sand berm as quickly as possible . . . Ultimately, any effort to expedite these berms will be fully considered, but we remain committed to our American companies.”

Left unanswered is what role the 1920 Merchant Marine Act (Jones Act) has played in delaying foreign assistance. The Act was passed specifically to protect American companies from foreign competition. But this is an emergency and the Jones Act allows the President to waive the Act in an emergency.

Has the administration looked at waiving the to act? What role has its protectionist impulses played in delaying the spill’s containment. The Pots never mentions the law.