Modify or scrap the ‘touchback’ provision
THE CW-1 “touchback” provision is a punitive federal rule imposed on a depressed local economy struggling with, among many other things, a labor shortage.
The NMI U.S. Workforce Act, or Public Law 115-218, states that the employer of a CW, who has been in the CNMI for three years, may not apply for a fourth, one-year work permit, until the worker has been outside of the United States for a 30-day period.
However, it takes USCIS usually about two months to reply to an application. In effect, an employer will lose valuable, trusted and experienced workers for at least three months — if, that is, USCIS approves the petition.
And what about the CWs who, in 2017-2019, were entangled in the confusion and turmoil caused by USCIS’ heartless decision to drastically reduce the CW cap despite pending legislation in the U.S. Congress to extend the program? What’s in store for them once they “exit” the CNMI and face a U.S. embassy official in their home countries?
The “touchback” provision aims to “protect” hypothetical (that is, nonexistent) qualified U.S. workers from “foreign competition.” The CW program exists, however, because of the perennial lack of qualified U.S. workers for certain occupations.
Come to think of it, do federal policymakers know that even under the U.S.-administered Trust Territory government, the NMI was already hiring foreign workers?
And what about the U.S. itself with a population of over 330 million and a high-paying, ever growing economy? Has it finally “weaned” itself off hiring foreign workers?
The touchback provision, in any case, is an economically nonsensical rule that needlessly punishes legal foreign workers and their employers, many of whom are U.S. citizens or residents who pay taxes to — and generate revenue for — the CNMI government that provides services and other programs to other U.S. citizens and residents.
The touchback provision has to be scrapped, suspended or at least modified especially now that the CNMI is facing a full blown economic depression.
The public should know
THE new administration, by now, should be able to provide more detailed answers to the following questions:
• Will the CNMI government achieve its revenue targets for the current and subsequent quarters of this fiscal year? If there is a shortfall, how much is it?
• When will the austerity measures take effect? And what are these measures? Work-hour cuts, pay cuts, austerity Fridays, furloughs — the usual?
Incidentally, even though the review of the government’s finances, including the expenditure of ARPA funds, is still ongoing, a lawmaker has already claimed that the CNMI is in a much worse state compared to what it was after Super Typhoon Yutu.
Please. Yutu destroyed and/or severely damaged homes, schools, other buildings and airports while killing two people and injuring at least 133 individuals. Saipan and Tinian were left without electricity. The tourism industry went into a coma. The list of distressful and inconvenient things that the people had to endure during those days is long.
Today, faced with another economic crisis and an insolvent (again) government, the CNMI people still have options, including voting with their feet and heading to Guam or the states which was something they couldn’t do in the immediate aftermath of Yutu.
