June 25, 2026 — A federal judge has ordered the State of Alaska to pay nearly $ 1.8 million dollars in attorney fees to four Native groups, following a long-running fight over subsistence fishing rights in Southwest Alaska.
The case began four years ago when federal managers sued the state for failing to uphold a rural subsistence priority required under federal law. The Native groups joined the lawsuit. And the state ultimately lost a series of court battles, which culminated when the U.S. Supreme Court decided not to hear the case.
For now, this long-standing legal battle over subsistence management is at a standstill. But the legal bill is due — and the cost of that fight has raised new questions.
A clash of state and federal law
The litigation stems from a long-standing conflict between the Alaska Constitution and the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, or ANILCA, a law Congress passed in 1980. It gives priority to rural Alaskans to hunt and fish in times of scarcity.
But this kind of geographic preference runs up against the Alaska Constitution, which says all Alaskans have an equal right to natural resources. Under Article VIII, courts have ruled that giving preference based on where someone lives is unconstitutional and discriminatory.
The battle over rural priority led the federal government to take over management of subsistence in waters that flow through federal land. On the Kuskokwim River, dual management was especially problematic, because the 700-mile river runs through both state and federal lands.
For many years, state and federal managers shared responsibility for the fishery, with the state usually taking the lead in most of the decisions. But it was never an easy partnership, one that grew more difficult after salmon runs began to fail. In 2020, tensions reached a breaking point, when managers issued conflicting orders for subsistence fishing.