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‘We need to educate Congress about the CNMI’
Aside from lobbying for amendments to Public Law 110-229, the law that gave federal jurisdiction over CNMI immigration and the birth of the CNMI-Only Transitional Worker program, the Northern Marianas Business Alliance Corp. also wants to educate Congress about the labor situation in the CNMI.
The NMBAC officers are set to go to Washington, D.C. for a series of meetings from Dec. 11 to 15, 2017
According to NMBAC board member Marian Aldan-Pierce, a big part of the trip is explaining the situation in the CNMI. “Before P.L. 110-229 became law in 2008, probably a lot of the staffers who were a part of that are gone. One of our goals is to go to Washington and educate the ones there today about our history.”
“We have a different history, unlike anybody else. They should understand that this is not about immigration but about our economy. But what they are doing is that they are put us together in the national debate and that’s unfair because all of the workers are here legally,” she added.
Aldan-Pierce said that CW-1 workers are here at the invitation of the business community and the CNMI.
“For foreign workers to get lumped into the same category as illegal aliens, that’s terribly unfair. So that is one thing that the people in D.C. need to understand and I don’t think they do,” Aldan-Pierce said. “It is very important when we go there to show that there is a difference so treat us differently.”
