U.S. President Donald Trump has signed the 2026 military spending bill – which includes several seafood provisions – into law.
The legislation was passed by the U.S. House 10 December, with the U.S. Senate following suit a week later on 17 December. Trump signed the bill into law the following day.
Seafood advocates were able to slip some measures into the legislation, although several others were dropped during negotiations resolving differences between the U.S. House and Senate versions of the appropriations bill.
Most notably, the passed legislation finally updates the federal law to align with latest version of the South Pacific Tuna Treaty, which was last negotiated in 2016. The original 1987 treaty gave American purse-seine tuna vessels access to the exclusive economic zones (EEZ) of 16 Pacific Island states and has been updated multiple times over the years. However, U.S. law had not been updated to reflect the changes made in the 2016 renegotiations, and the purse-seine fleet has been operating under a memorandum of understanding in the interim.
U.S. Delegate to the House from Amata Catherine Coleman Radewagen (R-American Samoa) has been pushing the South Pacific Tuna Treaty Act to update that language, but had not been able to get it passed by the Senate. Radewagen’s legislation was incorporated into the final version of the 2026 military appropriations bill, securing its passage by the Senate at long last.
“My bipartisan legislation, which I introduced with Congressman Ed Case (D-Hawai’i) as the original cosponsor, provides congressional direction and statutory authority to fully implement the South Pacific Tuna Treaty and supports the stability of U.S. tuna fleet operations. This treaty was negotiated among the U.S. and 16 Pacific Islands nations, operating on a Memorandum of Understanding awaiting Congress to pass these policies into law,” Radewagen said in a social media post. “In beautiful American Samoa, our marine economy depends on fishing, and is a constant priority. Implementing this treaty helps conclusively guide operations and decision-making for our fleet, and secure U.S. tuna in our national food supply chain.”
The final version of the military spending bill also included a ban on the military procuring seafood from China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia to serve in dining halls or commissaries, combing similar proposals in both the House and Senate.
The legislation also allows commercial fishers to utilize automatic identification system devices to mark fishing gear through the end of 2029.
The bill also reauthorizes funding for fishing vessel safety grants and safety training grants for fiscal years 2026 and 2027. The original language of that provision in the House version included USD 6 million (EUR 5.1 million) in funding for both grant programs and authorized them through 2029.
Still, other seafood proposals were abandoned entirely during final negotiations.
The Fighting Foreign Illegal Seafood Harvest (FISH) Act – which would establish a blacklist of vessels involved in illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing and ban them from U.S. waters – was included in the Senate version, but not the House version of the bill. The provision was dropped during negotiations.
The House version has included a three-year pilot program on using fish skin regeneration products to treat burns and blast injuries, but it was also dropped in negotiations.
