Relief could soon be on the way for American Samoa’s tuna fleet from the Pacific Remote Islands Monument.
As KHJ News Washington correspondent Matt Kaye reports, President Trump has just signed an executive order to review monument designations going back more than 20-years…
The President ordered the Interior Department to review national monumentdesignations by his three predecessors, a period covering 21-years.
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The move could undo parts of former President Obama’s Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, the largest marine protected area in the world, encompassing key commercial fishing areasfor American Samoa’s tuna industry.
Congresswoman Aumua Amata Radewagen, after the signing ceremony, on whether the order will result in relief for the tuna fleet—
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Radewagen wrote President Trump in March to seek renewed fishing rights for US boats in the Remote Islands Monument.
She also sought help from Vice President Mike Pence to undo the Monument.
Separately, Senate Finance Chairman Orrin Hatch—a key ally in the monument fight—met personally with President Trump at the White House about the Bears Eagles Monument in Utah…
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American Tunaboat Association chief Brian Hallman told the Water, Power and Oceans Subcommittee in March, the closures around remote,uninhabited US islands in the Pacific, were made with no advance consultation with US fishing interests or the territories.
Hallman complained that President Obama’s decision was not based on science, that the tunas in the Remote Islands Monument are “highly migratory” and fishing there was already regulated and sustainable.
More US restrictions he added, only help US competitors.
The executive order will direct Interior officials to “suggest legislative changes…to the monument proclamations.”
Presidents have the power under the Antiquities Act to establish a monument, but may not have the right to abolish one, based on a 1938 Attorney General’s opinion.
But there is precedent for a president to shrink monuments’ boundaries, theWashington Post reports…an approach Trump may take, since it could be easier to defend in court.
