The first-ever rally for fishing rights drew between 3,000 and 5,000 people to Washington, D.C. yesterday in an effort to bring attention and action to the increasingly restrictive regulations on saltwater fishing in the U.S. Over 20 federal lawmakers joined the several thousand fishermen from around the country in the three-hour rally supporting national fisheries reform.
“The gathering was an incredible success," said Jim Donofrio, Executive Director of the Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA) and one of the key organizers of the historic rally.
At noon Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY), lead sponsor of Senate Bill 1255, the Flexibility in Rebuilding American Fisheries Act, opened the rally with a speech supporting the cause to reform the Magnuson-Stevens Act (MSA) to allow greater flexibility in the timetables to rebuild fish stocks. "Shame on the Magnuson-Stevens Act," Schumer said, “MSA as currently written denies fishermen access to healthy and rebuilding stocks due to arbitrary, 'time-specific' deadlines. We need flexibility to be able to thrive," Schumer promised the crowd, while charging federal bureaucrats with failure to recognize the impact of their decisions on working families. "We need to start caring about our fishermen as much as our fish.”