PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • February 27, 2023
Maine’s lobster fishery may have received a six-year reprieve from any new regulations, but lobstermen are still wrapped up in litigation over the most recent rule changes, which they say are burdensome and needless. The Maine Lobstermen’s Association in September appealed a ruling in a lawsuit against federal regulators, disputing the science behind fishing restrictions intended to protect the endangered North Atlantic right whale. The animals risk injury or death when they become entangled in lines or gear. But in December, Maine’s delegation was able to include a rider in a federal omnibus spending package that protects lobstermen from new rules for six more years. The Center for Biological Diversity said that the omnibus provision will almost certainly begin an irreversible path toward the whales’ extinction.