U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) on Thursday took aim at a threat to Alaska fishermen and the Alaska seafood industry, attempting to address the continued import of Russian seafood into the U.S., despite there being a prohibition in place. Sen. Sullivan attempted to expedite passage of his recently-introduced U.S-Russian Federation Seafood Reciprocity Act of 2023, bipartisan and bicameral legislation to close a loophole that is allowing Russian-origin seafood that has been reprocessed in other counties to be imported into the U.S. at the same time American fishermen are afforded zero access to the Russian market—but his bill was blocked by Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.). In February of 2022, Sen. Sullivan attempted to pass similar legislation to establish reciprocity in the U.S.-Russia seafood trading relationship, but the effort was also blocked by Sen. Markey.
“Russian seafood companies are largely owned by Russian oligarchs who are supporting Putin’s war of aggression in Ukraine, and, of course, they have been stealing market share from American and Alaskan fishermen. Does anyone in America think this makes sense? It doesn’t,” said Sen. Sullivan. “Russia and China are colluding to avoid the Biden executive order. It is hurting American and Alaskan fishermen, once again, and it is strengthening Russia: the oligarchs, the government, the Putin war machine…What I am trying to do now with my legislation is close the loophole. It is going to broaden the application of the President’s executive order to encompass seafood products harvested in Russian waters or by Russian vessels. That is it. That is what my bill does. Who in America, who in the Senate would be against that?”
In March of 2022, at the urging of Senators Sullivan and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), President Joe Biden signed Executive Order 14068, which prohibits the import of unaltered seafood originating from Russia. However, EO 14068 failed to block Russian seafood that has been substantially transformed in another country through reprocessing. American fishermen are still blocked from selling on the Russian market due to Russia’s own prohibition on the import of U.S. and other western seafood products since 2014.
Senator Sullivan has continued to press the Biden administration to close the loophole, including in a productive phone call today with Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Wally Adeyemo.
