Walker: Trump plans meeting with Pacific governors

Alaska Gov. Bill Walker told reporters that the meeting, scheduled for Friday in Hawaii, is expected to focus on Trump’s upcoming trip to Asia and “Pacific theatre issues” affecting the governors. (Photo By James Brooks, CC BY 2.0)

JUNEAU, Alaska — President Donald Trump plans to meet with the governors of Alaska and Hawaii and Pacific U.S. territories amid ongoing tensions with North Korea.

Alaska Gov. Bill Walker told reporters that the meeting, scheduled for Friday in Hawaii, is expected to focus on Trump’s upcoming trip to Asia and “Pacific theatre issues” affecting the governors.

Walker, who is politically unaffiliated, has raised concerns with North Korea weapon’s tests and suggested the strategic importance of having a naval base in Alaska.

The governors of the U.S. territories of Guam, American Samoa and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands were invited to the meeting, Walker said.

Walker plans to travel to Hawaii with Trump’s team from Washington, D.C., where Walker testified before a U.S. Senate committee Thursday in support of opening a portion of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas exploration.

Walker said he then plans to travel separately from Trump to China.

There, Walker and the head of the Alaska Gasline Development Corp., a state-supported corporation that has been courting Asian investors for a proposed mega-gas project in Alaska, will be part of a delegation expected to participate in events with Trump.

Walker said he sees it as major opportunity to draw attention to the long hoped-for liquefied natural gas project, which has been marked by changes in direction and has seen interest by Alaska state legislators wax and wane.