Former Maine Governor Paul LePage has joined opposition to a NOAA proposal to reduce vertical lines used in the state’s lobster facility by 50 percent.
LePage, a Republican, sent a three-page letter to U.S. President Donald Trump opposing the proposal, which is intended to prevent the deaths of the endangered North Atlantic right whale, according to the Portland Press Herald. His opposition unites him with both the state’s current legislature and current Democratic governor Janet Mills, who has threatened to defy the NOAA plan.
In the letter, LePage called the plan “another federal overreach in response to big money environmentalists.”
“Maine’s entire lobster industry is in turmoil because these businesses cannot plan what their next year will look like,” LePage wrote. “This issue reminds me of the plight of the coal miners in West Virginia for whom you have advocated so passionately. Liberal environmentalists disparage the hard, dangerous jobs done by real people.”
The recommendation to reduce gear came from NOAA’s Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Team back in April after a number of meetings that were kicked off due to a number of right whale deaths in 2017 caused by entanglements with fishing gear. While 2019 initially seemed promising for the whales, a number of recent deaths - some once again due to entanglement with fishing gear - has brought the issue to the forefront once again.
