By Gemma Q. Casas
Variety News Staff

THE U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources has asked the help of the U.S. Department of the Interior in drafting the CNMI immigration federalization bill.
In a letter to Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne, U.S. Senate Committee Chairman Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., and ranking member Pete V. Domenici, R-N.M., said they must come up with a “line-in/line-out revision of the base S.507 text.”
“This is a time-sensitive request, and we ask that you respond to the committee by…Monday, April 30, 2007…. We expect that questions will arise as this drafting service proceeds and we encourage you to contact Allen Stayman or Josh Johnson of the committee staff if further guidance is needed,” Bingaman and Domenici said in their letter.
S. 507 refers to the Northern Mariana Islands Covenant Implementation Act which is identical to S. 1052, the immigration federalization bill passed by the U.S. Senate in Feb. 2000.
The U.S. House of Representatives did not act on the bill, which was also supported by the then-Clinton administration.
Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Insular Affairs David Cohen, who represents President Bush in the 902 talks with the CNMI government, said the result of the discussions will not affect the move in the U.S. Congress to draft the CNMI federalization legislation.
Cohen said the U.S. Senate committee requested Interior to perform a “drafting service” on the bill.
“This is called the drafting service,” Cohen said in an interview yesterday. “Congress may request an executive branch agency to do the drafting. The administration does not necessarily need to support what we draft, but this is something that when asked for, we will provide to the Congress,” he said.
“We’re going to have the 902 discussions here next week, which is really the main purpose of my visit. That will give the CNMI an opportunity to present its views and see if they have any suggestions to make (in connection with the yet-to-be-drafted bill).”
Bingaman and Domenici, in their letter to Interior, said “we request that you…incorporate the principles that were presented in the administration’s testimony by Mr. Cohen, the seven concerns raised by Resident Rep. Pedro A. Tenorio in his testimony and further input that will be provided to your staff by the committee based on recent and continuing discussions with Gov. Benigno Fitial and other CNMI government, business and community leaders.”
Introduced by then-Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Ak, S. 507/S. 1052 would have extended federal immigration law to the CNMI and provided a 10-year transition period for the issuance of nonimmigrant temporary alien worker visas.