Environmental Policy News

For Fisheries Regulations, Trump Edict Signals Uncertainty

New England fishermen and conservationists fear one of President Trump’s executive orders will have disruptive effects on fisheries management, although it will not affect routine seasonal fisheries regulation, as some had initially feared.

The order prompted a fiery letter three days later from two prominent Democratic congressmen pointing out it could have “devastating impacts on commercial and recreational fisheries and the businesses and communities they support.”

“Effectively what it means is that nobody can do anything because agencies will have to stop doing major regulatory actions because you can’t comply with this order, which may be the point,” says a former top federal fisheries management official, Andrew Rosenberg, who is now director of the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Rosenberg, NOAA’s deputy director for fisheries in the late 1990s, notes that big amendments to groundfish and scallop plans in New England were considered “significant regulatory actions” under the Clinton-era rule, and so would others going forward. For these sorts of large and important revisions to management – whether opening up a fishery or closing one down in an emergency – compliance with Trump’s new order would be impossible. “The whole thing makes no sense at all from a regulatory perspective,” he says.

Drew Minkiewicz, a Washington, D.C., lawyer representing larger Eastern Seaboard scallop fishermen, says fishermen need not be concerned about most regulations. “This executive order has zero impact on 99.9 percent of the fishing regulations going out, so people who are wondering if the fishing season will be delayed don’t need to,” he says. “It’s much ado about nothing.”

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