President Donald Trump’s decision to exit a major settlement agreement in the legal battle over Pacific Northwest hydropower facilities and their impacts on endangered fish populations — and upend efforts to breach several dams in the region — drew praise from GOP lawmakers, but environmental groups, state officials and Democrats on Capitol Hill vowed not to abandon the deal’s ambitions.
Trump signed a memorandum Thursday ordering his administration to withdraw from the $1 billion “Resilient Columbia Basin Agreement” reached in late 2023 with the Nez Perce, Yakama, Warm Springs and Umatilla tribal nations, as well as the states of Oregon and Washington.
“It is essential to protect Americans’ ability to take full advantage of our vast natural resources to ensure human flourishing across our country,” Trump wrote in the memo titled “Stopping Radical Environmentalism to Generate Power for the Columbia River Basin.”
The legal agreement adopted by the Biden administration halted a long-running legal battle over 14 dams in the Pacific Northwest, putting the lawsuit on hold for up to a decade while the federal government and plaintiffs weighed options for boosting imperiled salmon and steelhead trout populations, potentially including the removal of some dams.
