Op-Ed: Formal opposition and demand for halt to proposed Marine Minerals Lease Sale in Pacific Waters (American Samoa Region)

By By Tuifagaloa Dr. Afu Lefaoseu III As a candidate for the United States House of Representatives representing the territory of American Samoa, a citizen of the United States of America, local resident of American Samoa, and a military combat veteran who has dedicated more than 15 years to defending this nation in multiple combat deployments, I am writing to express my unyielding opposition to the Department of the Interior and the Marine Minerals Administration’s expedited timeline to lease approximately 18 million acres of our outer continental shelf for deep-sea polymetallic nodule mining this coming August. On behalf of the indigenous people, fishermen, and families of American Samoa, I demand an immediate halt to this lease sale. The federal government’s rush to open our sacred ocean floor to destructive corporate exploitation, while intentionally delaying vital funding for Pacific Island outreach and consultation until after the leases are finalized, is a profound violation of our rights to self-determination and environmental justice. We will not allow our ocean ecosystem to be treated as a corporate testing ground. This lease sale must be stopped based on two critical pillars of federal law and environmental reality: 1. Violations of the Coastal Zone Management Act (CZMA) Federal Consistency Provision While the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management asserts total jurisdiction beyond the 3-mile territorial sea boundary, Section 307 of the Coastal Zone Management Act (16 U.S.C. § 1456) explicitly dictates that federal agency activities affecting any coastal use or resource of a territory's coastal zone must be fully consistent with the enforceable policies of that territory's approved coastal management program. Deep-sea mining cannot be contained by arbitrary borders. The midwater sediment plumes generated by the high-volume returning of toxic mining slurry—laden with pulverized rock and heavy metals—will be carried directly into American Samoa’s territorial waters by deep ocean currents. Because these plumes and the potential chemical leaching directly degrade the marine environments, water quality, and coral reefs within our 3-mile zone, this federal lease sale directly triggers a CZMA consistency conflict. American Samoa’s coastal zone is inextricably linked to these outer waters; therefore, advancing this lease without a formal, locally approved Consistency Determination is a violation of federal law. 2. Irreversible Destruction of Pelagic Fisheries and the Food Chain American Samoa’s economy and cultural heritage are fundamentally built upon our fisheries. The tuna industry is our primary private employer, and pelagic fish are our chief dietary resource. The scientific realities of deep-sea mining pose an existential threat to this lifeline: ● Disruption of the Sunlit Zone: The creation of expansive midwater sediment plumes threatens the pelagic ecosystem. Increased turbidity clouds the sunlit zones, displacing vital migratory species like skipjack and yellowfin tuna. ● The Threat of Bioaccumulation: Heavy metals such as copper, cobalt, nickel, and manganese, stripped from the nodules during extraction, dissolve into the water column. These toxins will be absorbed by plankton and move rapidly up the food chain, bioaccumulating in pelagic fish. This poses severe, unstudied health risks to our local population and threatens to completely collapse the commercial viability of American Samoa’s fish processing industry. 3. Immediate Public Health and Worker Safeguard Failures As a local resident, I must also call attention to the severe land-based risks of this lease proposal. Should our harbors or land be utilized to transship, handle, or process these polymetallic nodules, local workers will be exposed to toxic particulate dust. Inhalation of high concentrations of manganese dust causes irreversible neurological damage and cognitive impairment closely mirroring Parkinson’s disease, while nickel and cobalt exposure causes chronic respiratory illness and elevated malignancy risks. BOEM has provided absolutely no medical impact assessments or worker safety protocols to address these hazards for our territorial workforce. The current federal approach completely rejects the precautionary principle. A 20-year lease on our seabed cannot be rushed through as a bureaucratic box-ticking exercise to fulfill an expedited industrial agenda.Under Executive Order 0006-2024, American Samoa has already established a baseline moratorium on mining within its territorial waters. As a future lawmaker, I am actively working to block all land-based processing and port access for deep-sea minerals, effectively neutralizing the logistical viability of your proposed outer shelf operations. I strongly urge BOEM to respect the voice of the American Samoan people, honor the legal mandates of the Coastal Zone Management Act, and cancel the proposed August 2026 Pacific lease sale until comprehensive, independent, multi-year ecological and health impact studies are conducted in full transparency with our local community. (Originally sent as a letter to Matt Giacona, Acting Director Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), U.S. Department of the Interior and cc:ed to Samoa News) Section: Opinion Tags: deep sea mining
2026-05-22 16:48:23