Saving Seafood

Trump and Biden wage a big battle over one electoral vote in rural Maine

September 24, 2020 — Maine is getting an outsized share of Trump love these days.

The president visited a remote town of 1,500 in June. His son and daughter-in-law, Eric and Lara Trump, have stumped in the state. A lobsterman from tiny Swan’s Island spoke at the Republican National Convention in August.

And the president is showering federal largesse on the state’s pandemic- and tariff-battered fisheries.

“He is very, very concerned on the plight of our fishermen,” former Maine Gov. Paul LePage told a recent rally along Saco Bay with Eric Trump. “He is intent on helping.”

Read the full story at The Los Angeles Times

State of Maine: Presidential order lacks public process

June 15, 2020 — President Donald Trump came to Maine last Friday to visit Puritan Medical Products, the Guilford manufacturer producing swabs for COVID-19 tests. The century-old company has a right to be proud. 

They took a traditional Maine resource—wood—and turned it into highly successful products that, like Maine itself, are more practical than glamorous. The humble toothpick, with a touch of mint flavoring added? Genius. And the tongue depressor, familiar to every child when it was time to say “aaah.” 

Puritan added “tipped applicators” to their production line in 1978. They now make 65 different types of swabs, over 12 million per day. They are an accredited medical device manufacturer, perfectly positioned to respond to a critical need in a pandemic.  

Presidential visits are planned in excruciating detail. This one was announced on the Monday prior and on Wednesday, just two days before it took place, the Guilford Town Manager said the town office had not been officially contacted about the visit. Nevertheless, it went off without a hitch.  

If the visit to Puritan was a standard “grip and grin,” albeit without the gripping, the meeting preceding it was anything but. Air Force One landed at the Bangor airport where the president met with Maine fisheries representatives. Typically, the governor hosts a presidential entourage. This time it was the former governor, Paul LePage, who did the honors. Current Governor Janet Mills was not invited.  

Read the full story at the Mount Desert Islander

President Trump signs proclamation to end fishing restrictions in marine monument waters

June 8, 2020 — When President Trump landed at Bangor International Airport he was greeted by leaders of Maine’s commercial fishing industry and a familiar face.

The President visiting Maine for the first time since he was elected into office back when Paul LePage was governor – who was there to greet Trump as he made his way off the aircraft.

Inside the hangar, Mainers from the fishing community, members of the President’s administration and Paul LePage bounced around topics including the national marine monument designated by the Obama Administration in 2016.

“I ordered the formation of a trade task force that will identify opportunities to open foreign markets to our seafood exports. We’re going to talk about the European Union. They simply take advantage of us on trade,” said President Trump.

Trump signing a proclamation to reverse the restrictions on fishing in the protected waters.

Read the full story at WABI

Food banks pushed to the brink

June 8, 2020 — The coronavirus pandemic and economic slowdown has left at least 20 million Americans out of work, sending demand skyrocketing at food banks and other feeding programs around the U.S. The Agriculture Department is already spending $3 billion on surplus meat, dairy, fruits and vegetables to help nonprofits meet their needs, but anti-hunger advocates say there’s another way Washington should help: Increase food stamp benefits so hungry families can buy more groceries instead of leaning on food banks.

The president on Friday threatened once again to slap duties on automobiles from the EU because of the bloc’s tariffs on U.S. lobsters. Trump said he’s putting Peter Navarro in charge of resolving the dispute, dubbing his hawkish trade adviser the “lobster king,” reports Pro Trade’s Doug Palmer.

The EU currently has an 8 percent tariff on live Maine lobsters, plus duties ranging from 16 percent to 20 percent on processed lobster. Meanwhile, Canada can export lobsters to Europe without paying any duties, leaving U.S. producers at a disadvantage.

“That’s an easy one to handle,” Trump said at a roundtable with commercial fishermen in Bangor, Maine, on Friday. But his administration has negotiated with Brussels for two years without reaching an agreement, and in November, the EU rejected a U.S. proposal for a mini-trade deal covering lobsters and chemicals.

China, another large market for lobster exports, also imposed retaliatory duties on American lobsters after Trump slapped tariffs on a wide range of Chinese goods. Trump on Friday directed Navarro to put pressure on Beijing by slapping even more tariffs on some Chinese goods.

Trump opened up a national marine monument in the North Atlantic to commercial fishing, undoing ecological protections implemented by the Obama administration. Under the proclamation, the New England Fishery Management Council will determine the amount of fishing allowed in the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts, some 130 miles southeast of Cape Cod, Mass. Pro Energy’s Ben Lefebvre and Eric Wolff have the details.

Read the full story at Politico

Trump opens marine monument to fishermen, promises trade relief

June 8, 2020 — President Trump announced he was opening a national marine monument off the coast of southern New England to commercial fishing during a visit to Maine on Friday, an administrative rebuke of government regulation that holds big political appeal for the Maine fishing industry but little practical value.

At an hourlong roundtable with Maine fishermen in Bangor, Trump also vowed to use retaliatory tariffs to help the Maine lobster industry get better access to foreign markets, putting former Maine Gov. Paul LePage in charge of a task force on the matter, and vowed to increase the amount of federal funding to help Maine’s fishing industry survive the COVID-19 pandemic.

“You have never been treated properly, at least not for a long time,” Trump told the group. “Today I am signing a proclamation to reverse that injustice. … We are reopening the Northeast Canyon and Seamounts Marine National Monument to commercial fishing. Is that OK? Is that what you want? That’s an easy one.”

Read the full story at the Portland Press Herald

Reverse course: Trump declaration makes way for commercial fishing in Atlantic monument

June 8, 2020 — At a fisheries roundtable discussion in Bangor, Maine, on June 5, President Donald Trump signed a proclamation to allow commercial fishing in the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument. The change falls short of eliminating the Obama-era designation and will instead be “taking down a no-fishing sign,” according to David Bernhardt, Secretary of the Interior, who was at the table for the discussion.

“Under the last administration, commercial fishermen and Maine lobstermen were suddenly informed that nearly 5,000 square miles of ocean off the coast of New England would be closed to commercial fishing without justification,” Trump said in his opening remarks. “So we’re opening it today. We’re undoing [Obama’s] executive order.”

Trump’s opening remarks included reference to his executive order that seeks to review federal fisheries laws, create a seafood trade task force and clamp down on illegally harvested seafood. But retaliating against European Union tariffs became a recurring theme for the president in the discussion.

“I heard that Canada doesn’t have to pay a tariff going into Europe, but you do?” Trump asked the panel.

Read the full story at National Fisherman

Trump lifts commercial fishing ban in protected areas

June 8, 2020 — In an announcement cheered by the fishing industry and described as an “attack on our ocean” by opponents, President Donald Trump on Friday reversed a four-year-old decision by President Barack Obama that had abruptly ended commercial fishing within a 5,000-square mile area of the Atlantic Ocean deemed a national marine monument.

Trump’s new proclamation will not alter the boundaries of the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, which is the size of Connecticut, but amends the commercial fishing restrictions on its use that Obama had put in place using powers granted under the Antiquities Act of 1906. At the time, the Obama administration said the protections would “improve ocean resilience in the face of climate change, and help to sustain the ocean ecosystems and fishing economies in these regions for the long run.”

The president announced his decision during a visit to Bangor, Maine on Friday afternoon, where he was joined by former Gov. Paul LePage and fishing industry interests. Obama’s 2016 decision was “deeply unfair to Maine lobstermen” and “cost America’s fishermen millions of dollars,” Trump said.

“We’re opening it today,” the president said, according to a White House transcript. “We’re undoing his executive order.”

Read the full story at the New Bedford Standard-Times

President Trump Opens National Monument to Commercial Fishing

June 6, 2020 — President Donald Trump on Friday opened 5,000 square miles of ocean off the New England coast to commercial fishing, reversing an order signed by President Barack Obama shortly before he left office.

“I’m a believer in conservation, but they’ve gone crazy,” he said before an audience of Maine lobstermen, fishermen and crabbers.

The Obama order that declared the area a national monument “was deeply unfair to Maine lobstermen, threatened to cripple family businesses and cost American fishermen millions of dollars,” Trump said. He separately vowed to fight foreign tariffs that hurt the Maine seafood industry.

The Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument, which is larger than the state of Connecticut, is one of just five marine monuments and the first in the Atlantic Ocean. It is home to endangered right whales, sea turtles, puffins and rare deep-sea cold-water corals.

Read the full story at the Courthouse News Service

Trump Opens New England Marine Monument to Commercial Fishing

June 6, 2020 — President Donald Trump said he would allow commercial fishing in protected waters off New England, doing away with Obama-era safeguards meant to conserve deep-sea corals and endangered whales.

The action comes after years of lobbying and legal challenges by commercial fishermen eager to plumb the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument established by former President Barack Obama in September 2016.

Trump announced the news at a meeting Friday in Bangor, Maine, with some of those same fishing industry leaders, former Maine Gov. Paul LePage (R), and Interior Secretary David Bernhardt.

Trump said Obama did “a tremendous disservice” to Maine by making the monument off-limits to commercial fishing.

“They’ve regulated you out of business,” Trump told fishermen at the event.

Bernhardt said the boundaries of the monument won’t change under the proclamation, which Trump signed Friday.

Read the full story at Bloomberg Law

MAINE: LePage op-ed in Wall Street Journal criticizes proposed lobstering regulations

September 9, 2019 — An opinion piece by former Gov. Paul LePage published in the Wall Street Journal criticizes federal officials for proposing restrictions on the lobstering industry that fishermen say would put them out of business.

LePage writes that the restrictions required by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association would not actually reduce the number of right whale deaths in the Gulf of Maine because, he says, “No whale deaths due to entanglements or ship strikes have been recorded in Maine waters since 1998.”

However, in September 2016, the Portland Press Herald reported that NOAA officials concluded the death of a 43-foot right whale found floating off Boothbay Harbor was most likely caused by entanglement in fishing gear ropes.

Read the full story at News Center Maine