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| 📷 Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, left, confers with Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minnesota, at a hearing at the Capitol in Washington on Sept. 27, 2022. (AP photo by J. Scott Applewhite) |
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🌊 A senator says this agreement averted "an economic death sentence."
◉ Mills, Maine's congressional delegation and the lobster industry are trumpeting the major agreement announced Tuesday to get a six-year pause on federal rules aimed at protecting the right whale, plus funding for equipment and monitoring, into a spending bill expected to pass this week.
◉ It could effectively end a lawsuit from conservation groups who argue the federal government is not doing enough to protect endangered whales and savaged the deal. The lobster industry and its political allies note that there has never been a right whale death linked to Maine gear and say the new rules would effectively shut down the fishery.
◉ "It is in no way a diminution of the standards of the Endangered Species Act or the Marine Mammal Protection Act," Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, said about the agreement in a floor speech late Tuesday. "It merely pauses that economic death sentence until we have time to know how to navigate the solution and what the real definition of the problem is."
◉ Mills and the Maine delegation were set to discuss the agreement at a 9 a.m. news conference on Wednesday.
🔇 Tribes put King on blast for a sovereignty measure's failure.
◉ The lobster agreement, plus an Electoral College reform package led by Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and a defense spending increase championed by Rep. Jared Golden, a Democrat from the 2nd District, have highlighted the omnibus package funding the federal government into next fall.
◉ One major Maine measure did not make the cut: a tribal sovereignty item led by Golden and Rep. Chellie Pingree, a Democrat from the 1st District, that would automatically apply future tribal laws to the Wabanaki tribes of Maine, who are treated differently under a 1980 settlement.
◉ Tribal chiefs issued a blistering statement that blamed King for the package not making it in, with Chief Kirk Francis of the Penobscot Nation saying it was "hard not to suspect that the senator's opposition to the legislation is political in nature and not substantive."
◉ King, a former governor, has been aligned with Mills in opposition to the measure for months. His spokesperson said he has "serious concerns about the legislation in its current form and the unintended consequences it poses for the state of Maine." |
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What we're reading
🎁 She was in a bad car crash 26 years ago. Now she wants to know who saved her — and then mailed out her Christmas presents.
👞 The outgoing Maine chamber CEO reflects on the state's economic changes in his 29 years on the job.
🔇 New "rugged phones" are expected to save money and improve responses at a rural county's emergency management agency.
🔎 The new district attorney in eastern Maine says he will prosecute more sexual assaults than his embattled predecessor.
📪 Mail carriers rallied Sunday to say they are understaffed and overworked, Maine Public reports. |
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