I grew up on the Kuskokwim River, where we have always depended on salmon. On the Kusko, a baby’s first solid food is dried salmon strips. From my childhood fishing with my father to spending long summer days at fish camp with my own kids, fishing is a way of life for me and for so many Alaskans.
While there are commercial fishing areas like Bristol Bay and Prince William Sound whose fisheries are viable and have continued breaking records in recent years, it’s heartbreaking to witness the collapse of salmon populations in river systems we were able to rely on for generations. When I started fishing on the Kusko, six salmon returned for every spawning fish. Today, the return rate is less than one. The salmon runs that fed generations of Alaskans are shadows of what they were, and the communities that depend on them are suffering. I don’t have to tell Alaskans about this problem. We know the fish that used to fill our freezers and sustain our economy are smaller and harder to find.
I’ve seen the decline of our fisheries firsthand. I’ve seen our families suffer. And I’ve seen our fishermen have their livelihoods threatened. I’m running for Senate because it doesn’t have to be this way. We can take on the rigged system in D.C. and begin to restore abundance to Alaska.
The truth is, out-of-state factory trawlers and excessive bycatch are hurting Alaska. They are sweeping up more than 140 million pounds of bycatch. More halibut is killed as bycatch than is actually consumed.
But instead of reining in the trawling industry, Alaska subsistence and sport fishing are hit with crushing restrictions, punishing Alaskans while protecting the corporations doing the damage.
Instead of holding their corporate trawler donors accountable, D.C. politicians kick the can down the road with more studies. But we don’t need more studies to tell us what’s happening in front of our eyes. We need brave leadership ready to take this issue head-on right now.
That’s why I’m running, because our communities can’t afford to wait any longer. I’m backing a fisheries plan built around real solutions that reflect how existential this crisis is for Alaskans.
I’ll fight to ban factory trawling and keep midwater trawlers off the ocean floor. I’ll fight to secure real fishery disaster funding and get it to Alaska fishermen immediately, not a year from now. I’ll demand that NOAA enforce the rules on bycatch reduction already on the books, with modern electronic monitoring to hold violators accountable in real time. And I will fight tooth and nail to get survey and research dollars back to Alaska so our managers aren’t flying blind.
Restoring our fisheries also means investing in their future. Alaskans don’t believe in waste, but as a country we only use about 75% of each fish harvested. I’ll push for federal investment to help Alaska build a fish byproduct economy and strengthen our mariculture industry so we can keep leading the blue economy like we always have. We’ll protect the good-paying jobs we have and invest in jobs for our children and grandchildren.
Most fundamentally, I’ll fight for Alaska to get a real seat at the table. Decisions about Alaska’s fisheries should be made by Alaska, not Seattle, not Oregon, not D.C. I’ll fight to create tribal seats on the North Pacific Fishery Management Council, lock in the composition of the federal subsistence board and ensure our communities have a voice in managing the resources we depend on to live.
There is no Alaska way of life without our fisheries. And that’s why I’m in this fight: to bring back our fish, restore abundance, ensure Alaskans can feed their families and stand up to the rigged D.C. system that’s failing Alaska.
Mary Peltola is a candidate for U.S. Senate who previously served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2022 to 2025.
