| Politics/ CNMI: THE BATTLE FOR CONTROL RAGES ON |
Governor Fitial wants immigration control
Criselda B. Hernandez
The battle line has been drawn between those who believe the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) has been able to effectively control its borders and those who think it failed miserably and that it’s high time the US Government takes control.
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Discussing... US Congresswoman Donna M. Christensen, D-Virgin Islands(left) chats with CNMI Governor Benigno R. Fitial after the US House Subcommittee on Insular Affairs held a first ever Saipan field hearing on a bill seeking to extend US immigration laws to CNMI.
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Among those caught in the middle is the struggling economy, as well as thousands of long-term alien workers who fear reprisals from the local government, their employers or the local community for supporting the two pending bills in the US Congress seeking to federalise CNMI immigration.
“Commonwealth immigration laws and regulations control the entry of aliens into CNMI in a manner consistent with the intent and policies of the federal immigration system,” according to CNMI Governor Benigno R. Fitial, who is the leading voice of the pro-local control movement, along with the Saipan Chamber of Commerce, the biggest business group in the CNMI.
The opposite end is led by Pete A. Tenorio, CNMI’s Representative to Washington D.C. and Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Insular Affairs, David B. Cohen, and long-term foreign workers whose immigration status will be improved once either of the two pending bills in the US Congress is enacted into law.
“I do not believe that our overall track record in administering immigration speaks of an effective system of monitoring a non-resident workforce or providing protection for our resident workforce,” said Tenorio.
“It is my position that in summation, we have failed miserably and it is time to rectify these recurring mistakes by making a drastic course of correction.”
The question of whether the federal government should take over control of the immigration system took center stage on August 15 when the first ever US congressional hearing was held in the CNMI capital of Saipan.
The historic field hearing was to obtain testimony on H.R. 3079, or the Northern Mariana Islands Immigration, Security and Labor Act, which will subject the CNMI to federal immigration laws.
The hearing was held by the US House subcommittee on Insular Affairs led by Congresswoman Donna Christensen, D-Virgin Islands, who is also the author of the bill. She was accompanied by Congresswoman Madeleine Bordallo, D-Guam, and Congresswoman Eni Faleomavaega, D-American Samoa.
After the four-and-a-half hours hearing in the Guma Hustisia (Justice Building), Christensen said all the testimonies on the bill will be considered when the committee reviews H.R. 3079 back in Washington, D.C. But she predicts the bill she sponsored would undergo “minor” changes.
“I can say the bill will be changed somewhat as we move toward final passage. I can’t say specifically how right now, but it will not be far from where we are now,” Christensen said after hearing testimonies from 11 witnesses over a four-hour period.
In a surprise move during the hearing, Fitial gave Christensen a copy of his own proposed legislation that would give the United States greater control over CNMI borders while leaving the CNMI immigration system untouched.
Fitial described the bill as a “more effective and less intrusive” approach to addressing the need for greater border security in CNMI.
“It leaves Commonwealth officials responsible for making the critical decisions with respect to economic development and managing the workforce necessary to achieve the level of development desired by the community,” he said.
“We ask this subcommittee to consider our proposal carefully.”
Christensen, however, expressed doubt over the practicality of Fitial’s proposal when she said, “I think it would be difficult for the Coast Guard to work in an environment where US laws don’t fully apply.”
But Christensen later told the media that her subcommittee would review the governor’s submission.
Fitial’s proposed legislation retains the asylum provisions of H.R. 3079 and provides for federal and local sharing of information and resources in relation to immigration and federal screening of people entering the CNMI. But it does not touch on the controversial issue of improved immigration status for thousands of alien workers.
H.R. 3079 is similar to the US Senate bill drafted by Cohen—S. 1634—which also seeks to federalise CNMI immigration, except that H.R. 3079 has a provision granting CNMI a non-voting delegate seat to the U.S. Congress.
Both bills grant non-immigrant status to foreign workers who have been legally employed for at least five years.
If enacted into law, either of the two bills will allow eligible alien workers to freely travel, study and work in the United States and its territories—the same privileges currently enjoyed by citizens of the Freely Associated States.
Saipan Chamber of Commerce vice-president Alex Sablan said businesses fear that once long-term alien workers are granted non-immigrant visa, they could simply move to the US mainland in search of higher-paying jobs than what exist in the CNMI and leave the local economy in shambles.
Cohen said the CNMI is hampered by the lack of an effective pre-screening process for aliens wishing to enter the islands.
“In a post-9/11 environment and given CNMI’s location and the number of aliens that travel here, we believe that continued local control of the immigration system presents significant national security and homeland security concerns,” he said.
But Fitial said the CNMI has an effective and fair system for handling complaints by alien workers contrary to past allegations, and its commitment and institutional ability to maintaining an effective system of immigration control if evidenced by its implementation of a computerised arrival and departure tracking system.
The Saipan Chamber of Commerce said there is simply no empirical evidence that CNMI’s immigration system can be more effectively run through federal offices than by retaining local control of purposes of administering a tourism-based and employment-based immigration programme.
The chamber fully supports the enforcement of border protection by the federal government, which it said is explicitly contemplated in the covenant between CNMI and the US, but “federal control of local visa programmes is not.”
STATISTICS SPAT
In his oral testimony, Cohen said while the CNMI has recent successful prosecution of a case in which foreign women were pressured into prostitution, human trafficking remains far more prevalent in the CNMI than it is in the rest of the United States.
Cohen said during a 12-month period ending April 30, 2007, there were 36 female victims of human trafficking and sexual exploitation admitted to or otherwise served by Guma Esperansa, a women’s shelter operated by a Catholic non-profit organisation.
Some were under-age when they were trafficked into the CNMI for the sex industry. The CNMI population is roughly 70,000.
In his six-page testimony, Cohen said human trafficking is between 8.8 and 10.6 times more prevalent in the CNMI than it is in the US as a whole.
Cohen based this on the US State Department estimates that 14,500 to 17,500 victims are trafficked into the US each year from many places of the world, and this estimate includes not only women in the sex trade but men, women and children trafficked for all purposes, including labour. The US has a population of about 300 million.
“This is a conservative calculation that most likely makes the CNMI look better than it actually is. The number of victims counted for the CNMI includes only actual female victims in the sex trade who were served by Guma Esperansa.
“This is being compared with a US estimate of human trafficking victims of both genders that is not limited to sex trade. In an apples-to-apples comparison, the CNMI’s report card would be worse,” Cohen told the subcommittee.
During his turn to testify on the bill, Fitial junked Cohen’s allegation that “human trafficking remains far more prevalent in the CNMI than it is in the rest of the US,” saying that Interior’s conclusion resulted from a “misuse of statistics”.
“Contrary to Interior’s allegation, the US has a rate of trafficking incidents six and a half times the CNMI figure,” said Fitial.
“What is troubling about Interior’s contention is not that it is so wrong, but that Interior feels compelled to present such incorrect data to Congress to persuade members to enact legislation before they have an objective report of the relevant facts from the Government Accountability Office.”
Fitial said the proper comparisons to be made are the number of entrants into each jurisdiction annually.
In recent years, the CNMI has had about 450,000 entrants annually and the US had 33,675,608 entrants based on GAO and US Department of Homeland Security data.
“Using these statistics, it appears the CNMI had one trafficking offense for each 12,500 entrants, whereas the US had one trafficking offense for each 1924 entrants,” the governor said.
Christensen, during the hearing, said despite differences in the use of statistics, the fact remains that the CNMI has human trafficking cases that need to be addressed.
When Faleomavaega asked Fitial what he intends to do about the protesting alien workers he saw on his way to the hearing, Fitial said these workers are “illegals” who would be deported by the government.
The governor’s statement elicited chuckles from those present during the hearing.
The workers told ISLANDS BUSINESS the governor’s statement was not only harsh but illogical. “If we’re illegal, we won’t be here where police and immigration officers could easily catch us,” one of them said.
During a press briefing a day after the hearing, Cohen said he doesn’t mind the governor’s tirade against him during the congressional hearing on H.R. 3079. But Fitial’s sweeping statement describing the protesting workers as “illegals” was offensive, disturbing, unfair and demeaning.
“Even though the governor’s statements had a lot of strong words, I very much respect his prerogative to passionately argue his position so I was not offended by anything in his statement.
“The one thing that did offend me, however, was the remark that the people protesting outside the venue were all illegals,” he added.
In a major gathering of foreign workers three days after the hearing, they told Cohen that Fitial was wrong about workers who are supporting the federalisation bills.
“We are legal workers. We pay taxes, we are not hiding,” the workers said. The workers said they are hoping the governor will apologise to them.
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