Many in the state rely upon salmon to feed their families but those fish and others are increasingly hard to find. President Trump is trying to preemptively block election results in Alaska if the Republican incumbent loses. But in that state, the big issue in the Senate race has been an emotional fight over fish.
And that's because the salmon that have long sustained Indigenous people are not returning to some Western Alaska rivers. While people living in remote villages feel the loss of salmon most acutely, the issue could ultimately affect the balance of power thousands of miles away in Washington, D.C. Alaska public media's Liz Ruskin reports.
LIZ RUSKIN, BYLINE: Evon Waska lives at the water's edge, where he says his parents settled when they gave up their nomadic life. EVON WASKA: Well, this is my smokehouse, and this is where we make smoke, right? RUSKIN: Waska's drying racks should be filled with salmon, but they're empty.
Most years now, too few salmon return from the Bering Sea to his river, the Kuskokwim. To conserve fish, government agencies often close the river to fishing, even to those like Waska who fish to feed their families. Waska blames trawlers, industrial fishing boats miles offshore.
WASKA: They don't close the trawlers. They close me and my people first. RUSKIN: Waska is up against a $1 billion industry, much of it based in Seattle.
Picture a sock-shaped net that's a quarter mile long with an opening as wide as a football field. That's what trawlers tow to catch pollock. The white fish is served to you as imitation crab in McDonald's Filet-O-Fish.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
