Mitigation Action and Watermen Support Act of 2026

Floor Speech

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Ms. ELFRETH. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I am grateful that H.R. 4294, the MAWS Act, is included in today's suspension package, a piece of legislation I was so proud to work in partnership in crafting with the gentleman from Virginia.

The Chesapeake Bay, the largest estuary in the Nation that is responsible for $100 billion in annual economic value, is facing a critical, albeit delicious threat, the invasive blue catfish. These blue catfish were introduced into tidal areas of the bay in the 1970s for recreational purposes under the assumption that they would stay in the freshwater and not venture into the brackish water of the larger bay. That assumption has turned out to be catastrophically wrong. Blue catfish are now not only in every tidal area of the Chesapeake Bay watershed, but they are the most abundant biomass in many of them, and the threat is real.

Blue catfish can live up to 20 years. They can weigh up to 100 pounds. They eat approximately 10 percent of their body weight every day and have an extremely fast metabolism. The imbalance my colleague from Virginia just spoke about in our ecosystem has created a situation where because they eat so much, their meals frequently consist of staples of our seafood industry and staples of Maryland and Virginia's culture: baby blue crabs, rockfish, even oysters, causing significant economic damage to our seafood industry at large, which is a central part of our economies in the bay region.

Making matters worse, these blue catfish, because they are invasive, have no natural predators in the bay to control that population growth. Because of this, they now estimate there are tens of millions of these fish throughout the entire Chesapeake Bay region, and that is growing rapidly.

The good news, Madam Speaker, is that blue catfish are nutritious and delicious, and they are high in protein and omega-3s. According to a new report from bay scientists, these catfish do not retain PFAS like other fish.

The market for human consumption has grown significantly across the region, due to a concerted marketing campaign, processors who make bold investments, chefs who are willing to take a risk with blue catfish dishes popping up in restaurant menus, and filets on sale at your local market.

However, that market has a few critical limitations that are inhibiting our ability to control this catastrophe. First, blue catfish are the only fish inspected by the USDA. All other fish are under the jurisdiction of the FDA, and this adds significant hurdles for seafood processors and watermen who want to sell blue catfish for human consumption.

I would be remiss, Madam Speaker, if I didn't highlight that this very red tape, this bureaucracy, is a limitation placed on the industry by the Congress itself.

Second, State health regulations indicate that blue catfish filet is safe for human consumption in fish no larger than 25 pounds. This means there are tens of millions of fish over 25 pounds or up to 85 pounds actually, that watermen struggle to sell because they cannot be processed for human consumption, and the market is not there.

Fortunately, they are completely safe for inclusion in the pet food industry.

Third, on the other end of the spectrum, there are millions of more than 1- to 2-pound blue catfish that are not big enough to filet and consequently aren't sold for processing for people. The smallest fish are among the most aggressive predators of the species that our industry relies on, stealthily eating eggs in otherwise hard-to-access habitats.

We have made significant critical progress like the USDA grant program which provides financial support to processors and food banks, but there remains the problem that only the very narrow window of 2- to 25-pound fish can be sold for human consumption.

We are left without a solution to the question: What are watermen supposed to do with every other size?

They can't just throw them back.

We can do our part, everybody here, and everybody watching at home, including my mother, can do their part in ordering the blue catfish when we see it on a menu. Again, it is delicious and nutritious. This is not a problem we are capable of eating our way out of.

That is why I introduced the bipartisan MAWS Act, alongside House Natural Resources Vice Chairman Wittman, to invest funds to address invasive blue catfish and strengthen our local seafood economy, while also providing a new source of protein to pets nationwide.

The MAWS Act establishes this pilot program within the NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office to facilitate a market for Chesapeake Bay blue catfish in the pet and animal food industry.

This program will complement the growing market for human consumption by forging new partnerships with pet and animal food manufacturers nationwide that otherwise do not have a footprint in the Chesapeake Bay, and it would establish a sustainable outlet for fish that are outside the window for human consumption by giving watermen and processors more opportunities to sell the smallest and largest blue catfish.

NOAA will enter into cooperative agreements with pet and animal food manufacturers to ensure watermen and processors are properly incentivized to catch blue catfish in the bay, and establish transportation, processing, and manufacturing structures for that long- term market need.

By having a customer base with consistent and reliable price points, watermen can feel confident that it is worth their while to catch blue catfish of all shapes and sizes, knowing there will be somebody at the end of the dock to buy it for a fair price.

Price points for this pilot program will be established in a collaborative effort between watermen, processors, manufacturers, scientists, and economists.

We spent a year crafting this bill, compromising to make sure that everybody's voices were heard and everybody had a seat at the table, ensuring every corner of the industry has a seat and a voice in the decision of what the baseline market price for fillet, byproduct, and whole fish will be for this program.

Additionally, in the many months of engagement on this bill with watermen, processors, and manufacturers, we learned that transportation mechanisms are a complex web of coordinated pickups, often with processors going right to the front door of the homes of watermen to pick up their daily catch.

In order to make participation in this program feasible and promote the establishment of long-term transportation processes, 15 percent of the total grant funding can be used by grantees to establish these new routes across the Chesapeake Bay in partnership with established routes led by processors.

Throughout this 2-year pilot program, NOAA will collect data on the ecological and economic impacts of the program. NOAA will report back to Congress on best practices, lessons learned, and recommendations for additional species in other watersheds that may benefit from this program.

Our seafood industry across the Chesapeake Bay is the heart of our economy, but many factors far outside the control of watermen and processors have left the industry in a dire situation. Extreme weather, deep freezes, unexpected waterway discharge, and a national affordability crisis are threatening the livelihoods of our watermen, not to mention the ever-increasing blue catfish population.

The MAWS Act, again, is the result of intensive collaboration and creativity of stakeholders across the watershed as we sought to address the ecological and economic damage of the invasive species in a way that complements--again, complements--and strengthens the growing market for human consumption.

This is not an either/or approach. This is a yes/and, all-hands-on- deck approach.

If this innovative approach is successful, it is our hope that a similar tool can be utilized to combat invasive aquatic species in other waterways across the Nation. Think carp that are wreaking havoc in the Mississippi River and the Great Lakes. Think snakeheads that are invading North Carolina, Missouri, Arkansas, and more.

I am proud to lead the effort of this one-of-a-kind legislation in partnership with my colleagues from Virginia, Representative Wittman and Representative Kiggans, as well as Representative Hoyer.

I thank the chair and his staff for providing such technical assistance to this bill, and I thank my colleagues for supporting this bill.

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Ms. ELFRETH. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time to close.

Madam Speaker, again, I reiterate my appreciation to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wittman), the committee staff, and all the stakeholders who spent the last year crafting this creative solution to a problem that threatens the economy and ecology of the greatest natural resource we have in Maryland and Virginia, the Chesapeake Bay.

This is an innovative solution. When you visit with other folks who are policymakers, what we hate to hear is, ``We have always done it this way,'' or, ``We have never done it that way.''

This moment, this crisis that we are experiencing in the Chesapeake Bay, requires innovation, creativity, partnerships, and collaboration. That is exactly what the MAWS Act represents, and I urge my colleagues to support this legislation.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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