Saving Seafood

Fishing industry says Trump’s Pacific monument order is about fairness, economy

April 23, 2025 — When President Donald Trump signed an executive order allowing commercial fishing in the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument last week, a familiar face stood to his left in the Oval Office.

The executive director of the Western Pacific Regional Fishery Management Council was there. Kitty Simonds has served on the council for decades. She’s the first Native Hawaiian woman to lead the agency.

Simonds said she attended at the invitation of American Samoa U.S. House Delegate Aumua Amata Coleman Radewagen, who had been writing to the administration about the plight of the territory’s fishing industry.

Speaking to The Conversation on Tuesday morning, Simonds shared the viewpoint of the commercial fishers who will now be allowed to operate in waters at least 50 miles offshore.

Opponents fear the order will hurt conservation efforts. Simonds said it’s about fairness for U.S. longliners in Hawaiʻi, Guam and American Samoa.

Read the full story at Hawaii Public Radio

Trump unveils executive order to boost U.S. seafood industry

April 23, 2025 — The Trump administration has released an executive order to restore American seafood competitiveness.

The order, released on April 17, states that the U.S imports nearly 90 percent of seafood and has a seafood trade deficit that stands at over $20 billion. So the country must establish an America-First Seafood Strategy to boost its seafood production, sales, and exports.

The executive order directs the Secretary of Commerce to consider taking actions on regulations that overly burden America’s commercial fishing, aquaculture, and fish processing industries.

The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) was directed to:

  • Incorporate better, cheaper, more reliable technologies and cooperative research programs into fishery assessments.
  • Expand exempted fishing permit programs to promote fishing opportunities nationwide.
  • Modernize data collection and analytical practices to improve the responsiveness of fisheries management to real-time ocean conditions.

Read the full story at Aquaculture North America

Alaska’s fishing industry sounds alarm over proposed NOAA cuts

April 22, 2025 — The commercial fishing industry relies on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for everything from marine weather forecasts to fisheries data. But NOAA — which lost hundreds of employees in February when the Trump administration fired probationary staff — is in the administration’s crosshairs again, according to a preliminary budget proposal from the White House Office of Management and Budget.

The budget calls for slashing NOAA’s funding by more than 27% for fiscal year 2026. It also restructures the agency’s fisheries division, shifting key responsibilities to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Frank Kelty, a fisheries consultant and former Unalaska mayor, said big changes like these could have major consequences for commercial fishing in Alaska.

Read the full story at the Bristol Bay Times

Commercial fishing could expand to more marine monuments

April 21, 2025 — President Donald Trump’s order to open a vast national monument in the Pacific Ocean to commercial fishing for the first time in two decades — and indications he could soon do the same to other protected waters — drew fire from environmental advocacy groups that warned the move could decimate fishing stocks.

Trump on Thursday issued an executive order rolling back prohibitions on commercial fishing across 400,000 square miles of the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument, or more than 80 percent of the sprawling site. The monument is located about 900 miles southwest of Hawaii in the central Pacific Ocean.

He issued a second order, titled “Restoring American Seafood Competitiveness,” that directs the Commerce and Interior departments to conduct a review of all marine national monuments — there are five, including the Pacific Islands Heritage site — and issue recommendations about any additional ones that should allow commercial fishing.

Read the full story at E&E News

Hawai’i fishermen, environmentalists react to Trump’s executive order to reopen waters in the Pacific

April 21, 2025 — Fishermen and conservationists are clashing over President Donald Trump’s executive order on Thursday to reopen protected waters in the Pacific to commercial fishing.

The decision, aimed at boosting American Samoa’s economy, would allow access to the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument. U.S. flagged ships would be authorized to fish commercially within 50 to 2,000 nautical miles outside the monument’s boundaries.

Members of the Hawai’i Longline Association (HLA) released a statement explaining the “significance of the proclamation for Hawaii’s fishing industry.”

“This is recognition that sustainable fisheries and ocean protection can be achieved and balanced within U.S. national waters,” HLA Executive Director, Eric Kingma said.

Read the full story at Island News

Nantucket anti-wind group petitions feds to halt Vineyard Wind 1

April 21, 2025 — After the Trump administration suspended the Empire Wind offshore energy project over claims of rushed approvals and inadequate analysis, Nantucket nonprofit ACK For Whales is urging federal regulators to take similar action against Vineyard Wind.

The group is calling for Vineyard Wind’s revised construction plan to be revoked due to unresolved safety and environmental concerns.

The island nonprofit, which opposes offshore wind development, has formally petitioned the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to rescind the construction and operations plan for Vineyard Wind 1.

The revised plan was approved Jan. 17, 2025, following a major turbine blade failure and the discovery of potential manufacturing defects affecting as many as 66 blades.

Read the full story at MassLive.com

Many Maine fishermen applaud Trump order calling for deregulation

April 21, 2025 — Many Maine fishermen are applauding a new executive order from President Trump, which calls on the federal government to identify and roll back regulations that are overly burdensome to the commercial fishing industry.

The order signals that the Trump administration wants to listen to commercial harvesters and involve them in decision-making and research, said Ben Martens, executive director of the Maine Coast Fishermen’s Association.

“There are a lot of regulations that you could take a scalpel to, right? We can clean things up,” he said. “There’s a piling up regulations that takes place over time, and so I think it needs to be done carefully.”

Jerry Leeman, CEO of the New England Fishermen’s Stewardship Association, described the order as a “long time coming.” Many of his members have long questioned the data that federal fisheries regulators use to conduct stock assessments and set stock limits.

Read the full story at Maine Public

Trump opens Pacific marine monument to fishing

April 21, 2025 — An executive order issued by President Trump opens the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument to fishing, asserting that U.S. environmental laws and regulation can adequately protect the islands’ marine ecosystem.

The move would allow fishing on more than 400,000 square miles west of Hawaii, declared a monument in 2009 by former president George W. Bush and expanded in 2014 by former president Barack Obama. It includes an array of reefs and seamounts around Wake, Baker, Howland, and Jarvis islands, the Johnston and Palmyra atolls and Kingman Reef.

U.S. Pacific fishermen and American Samoa officials and businesses have sought to lift restrictions on fishing, critical to the territory’s economy.

“As a result of the prohibitions on commercial fishing, American fishing fleets have lost access to nearly half of the United States’ Exclusive Economic Zone in the Pacific Islands,” according to the order Trump signed Thursday. “This has driven American fishermen to fish further offshore in international waters to compete against poorly regulated and highly subsidized foreign fleets.”

Read the full story at National Fisherman

 

Trump escalates his feud with offshore wind

April 21, 2025 — Donald Trump took his disdain for offshore wind to a new level this week.

The president moved to halt a wind farm off New York’s coast that was already under construction — a step analysts say sets a dangerous precedent for all energy projects, not just renewable ones, writes Benjamin Storrow.

“No one with any kind of an energy project can rely on the permits that have been issued if this administration, for whatever reason — legally or illegally, rightly or wrongly — decides that they want to call into question permits that have already been issued,” Allan Marks with Columbia University told Ben.

“That should scare any investor in any energy project.”

Interior Secretary Doug Burgum delivered the administration’s rationale in a social media post on X. The 810-megawatt Empire Wind project is being halted, he wrote, to review information “that suggests the Biden administration rushed through its approval without sufficient analysis.”

Read the full story at Politico

 

National Fisheries Institute Statement on Executive Order on American Seafood

April 21, 2025 — The following was released by the National Fisheries Institute:

Tonight, President Trump signed an Executive Order aimed at strengthening the U.S. seafood community. NFI commends the President and his Administration for taking a thoughtful, strategic approach to supporting American seafood production and consumption. The EO outlines key actions to benefit every link in the supply chain—from hardworking fishermen to parents who serve their family this nutritious and sustainable protein at home.

Importantly, the Order calls for reducing unnecessary regulatory burdens on fishermen and seafood producers while also promoting the many benefits of eating seafood as part of a healthy, balanced diet. 

NFI stands ready to support the Administration in advancing this important policy initiative and improving the lives of all those who depend on the commercial seafood industry.