09/20/2026
Trump Hands the Open Ocean and 92 Million Acres Back to the American People
President Trump signed twin executive orders Thursday that do something Washington has spent years avoiding: treat hunters, anglers, charter captains, and boaters like owners of the country instead of suspects.
One order, Restoring American Saltwater Angling and Recreation, directs agencies to suspend, revise, or rescind rules that have piled up on saltwater anglers, boaters, and coastal businesses. The other, Reinvigorating America’s Hunting Heritage, pushes a presumption of access on federal lands and builds on Interior’s earlier expansion of hunting and fishing across more than 92 million acres in 32 states — more than 95 percent of National Wildlife Refuge System lands.
The White House put the stakes in plain numbers. America’s outdoor recreation sector generates over $1.2 trillion a year and supports more than 5 million jobs. The saltwater order says federal fisheries management should stop treating recreation as an afterthought and start empowering the people who actually use the water.
Trump did not hide what he thought of the last administration’s approach. “The Biden administration tried to bludgeon the boating and maritime industry with a ridiculous boating speed limit of no more than 10 miles per hour,” he said. “American boaters can now once again enjoy the open ocean. And you can go slightly faster than 10 miles an hour, like 120 miles an hour if you’re crazy. But you can go as fast as you want.”
On the land side, the message was just as direct. “We believe that public lands belong to the AMERICAN PEOPLE and to the public. And hunters, fishers, and outdoorsmen should be able to access them.” The administration also said 92 million acres of federal lands have been opened up under Trump.
Nick Sortor captured the pairing in two posts Thursday night: first the land access, then the reversal of Biden-era rules on saltwater anglers, boaters, charter captains, and coastal communities. The hunting order frames American hunters and anglers as “the greatest conservationists the world has ever known” and says they should “reclaim our Nation’s wilderness.”
This is not a press-release conservation lecture. It is a policy bet that people who hunt, fish, and run boats will take better care of land and water than a bureaucracy that defaults to closures, mail-in surveys, and 10-mph nanny rules. Agencies now have marching orders to modernize catch reporting, ease permitting for compliant charter operators, review habitat work, and stop locking Americans out of what they already own.
Common sense is back on the water and on the refuge. The public lands are public again. The ocean is open again. And the people who actually use them no longer have to ask permission from the same crowd that spent years trying to slow them down to a crawl.
