The largest protected areas in the United States are found in the Pacific Ocean. Hundreds of thousands of square miles have been designated as national marine monuments, preserving the ecosystems of remote islands and atolls.
They’re home to colorful coral reefs, rare seabird colonies and are stopovers for marine mammals and fish that migrate thousands of miles. Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands is also culturally important to Native Hawaiians.
The Trump administration is considering opening some of these monuments to commercial fishing. The move is supported by U.S. fishing fleets facing international competition in the Pacific. Conservationists and some Indigenous groups are fighting to preserve protections that were decades in the making.
Reporting from Palmyra Atoll, this project explores these remote ecosystems and the scientific questions still being uncovered about their role in the larger Pacific Ocean. It also explores the tradeoffs of rolling back marine protections.
