In May, President Trump’s EPA settled the suits, reversing Obama-era efforts to prevent development. Parent company Northern Dynasty Minerals plans to apply for a federal mining permit, a process that will likely take years.

Alaska Seafood is a brand. The people of Alaska own the brand and the state government protects the brand through strict regulation and oversight. Millions of state, federal and private dollars have been invested in the Alaska Seafood brand and thousands of jobs depend on it. When a brand is tarnished, it can take years to recover. Sometimes, the brand is ruined forever.

New EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt. Last week the EPA reached a settlement agreement with the Pebble Limited Partnership, a subsidiary of Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd., which reverses EPA’s earlier decision that the project would be too detrimental to the salmon fishery.

We never imagined ourselves as public figures. We are fishermen at the core, more at home with our subsistence salmon setnet in Bristol Bay, running a gillnet operation in Cook Inlet or knee-deep in the Kvichak River hunting for rainbows.