June 6, 2020 — President Donald Trump announced on Friday he will open up a 5,000 square mile conservation area in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of New England to commercial fishing.
The move allows commercial fishing to resume in the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, a sanctuary created in 2016 during the Obama administration. It also cancels a planned phase out of red crab and lobster fisheries in the area.
Trump signed a proclamation on opening the area during a visit to Maine in his latest move to appeal to working class and blue collar workers in an election year by touting regulatory rollbacks that he says can restore jobs and economic activity.
“We’re cutting regulations from highways and roadways to fish,” Trump said at a roundtable event in Bangor.
Trump, who won in Maine’s rural 2nd Congressional district in the 2016 election, also announced he would create a task force to identify international markets for U.S. seafood.