From left to right: Ginna Owens (NextGen), Marin Plut (NextGen), Linda Behnken (Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association), Abby Dalke (SOS), Tanya Riordan (SOS), Keenan Sanderson (Tlingit Haida), and Amy Grondin (Duna Fisheries)

Recently, a team of advocates from Alaska, Washington, and Oregon flew to Washington, DC to advocate together on Capitol Hill for healthy abundant salmon populations and the benefits they bring to communities, cultures, and ecosystems across the entire Pacific Northwest.

Our team was two youth advocates with our NextGen Salmon Collective, two female commercial salmon fishermen, and a Tlingit & Haida member, along with Abby and myself from the SOS team. While geographically diverse, the unique, sacred thread that tied our team together was Columbia Basin salmon. As the map shows, some stocks of Columbia and Snake River salmon migrate as far north as Southeast Alaska – cycling nutrients from the Inland Northwest to the coast of Southeast Alaska and back. With a unified voice, our team asked policymakers to restore and protect these cherished species that connect us.

Show your support by taking action today!

We asked our Members of Congress to support the Columbia Basin Restoration Initiative (CBRI) a comprehensive plan to recover salmon and invest in communities developed by the “Six Sovereigns,” (the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation, the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation, the Nez Perce Tribe, and the states of Oregon and Washington). The CBRI is the pathway to restore Columbia and Snake River salmon and other native fish populations, ensure a clean and socially just energy future, support local economic resilience, and uphold our nation’s longstanding unmet commitments to Tribal Nations. Implementation of this historic, regionally supported plan will bring salmon abundance, and the prosperity that accompanies it, to communities from Idaho to Southeast Alaska.

We urged Members of Congress to oppose harmful attacks that would undermine important progress and implementation of the CBRI, and to secure critical funding in the Fiscal Year 2026 (FY26) budget as requested by the Six Sovereigns.

You can be a part of this important advocacy work by urging your members of Congress to support the Six Sovereigns’ FY26 Appropriations request to support the implementation of the CBRI. To learn more and take action click here.