January 29, 2026 — The International Pacific Halibut Commission set the 2026 harvest at a historic low during an annual meeting that drew a Trump administration political appointee to lead tense U.S. negotiations with Canada over shares of a shrunken fishery.
The four-day gathering last week in Bellevue, Washington, came during a time of tumultuous relations between the two nations.
President Donald Trump’s tariff policy and blustering talk of making Canada part of the United States have spurred widespread anger among Canadians. January has been particularly volatile, as Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, at an economic forum in Davos, Switzerland, attacked “coercion” by great powers, while Trump, in a subsequent speech, asserted that “Canada lives because of the United States.”
In private talks sandwiched between public parts of the meeting, the U.S. delegation threatened economic sanctions, and successfully pressured Canadians to trim the British Columbia share of the halibut harvest, according to sources with knowledge of these discussions.
The commission is charged by a more than century-old treaty with conserving Pacific halibut. There are three voting representatives from the United States and three from Canada.
The halibut fishery has been in a deep prolonged downturn that has buffeted sport, commercial and subsistence fishermen in Alaska, British Columbia, Oregon, Washington and Northern California. Since the early 2000s, both the average size and overall population of halibut have fallen precipitously, according to scientists.