HOUSE Floor Leader Ralph N. Yumul on Thursday pre-filed House Joint Resolution 22-18 calling for a joint session at 10 a.m. on Dec. 1 in the House chamber to receive Gov. Ralph DLG Torres’s State of the Commonwealth Address.
But the governor told Variety that he will deliver the SOCA on Oct. 31, 2022, at the Kensington Hotel.
On Sunday, Senate President Jude U. Hofschneider issued a memorandum calling for a special session at 8 a.m. today, Monday, Oct. 24, after pre-filing Senate Joint Resolution 22-13 to receive the governor’s SOCA on Oct. 31.
According to the CNMI Constitution, “The governor shall report at least annually to the legislature regarding the affairs of the Commonwealth and new measures that are necessary or desirable. The report shall include a comprehensive annual financial report prepared in accordance with generally accepted governmental accounting principles.”
Moving forward
In an email to Variety on Friday, the governor said he is thankful to the Legislature for coming together to plan a joint session.
“However, after already accommodating their request for a change of date and rescheduling the address for the 31st of October instead of October 21st as initially planned, I will be moving forward with delivering the SOCA on October 31st, 2022, at the Kensington Hotel,” the governor said.
“I regard my delivery of the SOCA to be a means of delivering transparency not just to the other branches of our government, but to the people we are called to serve. Therefore, I do not believe that it is in the best interest of the community to delay the SOCA any longer,” he said.
“If the members of the Legislature decide to hold a joint session on December 1st, then I will be there, but I will be delivering my address on October 31st, if not to them, then to the members of our community. I continue to extend my invitation for the event to the members of the Senate and the House of Representatives and continue to welcome the community to attend. The event is open to the public and will also be accessible live online,” the governor said.
Senate session
Senate President Hofschneider said his call for a special session on Monday, Oct. 24, “is pursuant to the Senate rules and Open Government Act.”
But minority bloc Sen. Paul A. Manglona disagreed, saying that scheduling a session a day after the memo “is not only in violation of the Open Government Act, 1 CMC, Section 9910(b), but also very obvious that the Senate is ‘racing’ to hold a session before the House holds their duly noticed session, scheduled for [Monday] at 9 a.m.”
Manglona said the Senate president previously sent out a memorandum on Oct. 19, 2022, calling for a regular session at 1 p.m. Monday, but cancelled it, and scheduled a special session instead.
Manglona said with the Senate president’s cancellation of the regular session to pave the way for a special session, “I was under the assumption that the Senate was taking the high road and will support the House’s resolution to hold the State of the Commonwealth Address on December 1, 2022.”
Manglona added, “It now seems that the Senate wants to hold its session tomorrow [Monday] which is in violation of the Open Government Act, just so that they can pass a resolution to have the SOCA on October 31, 2022, granting the wish of the Governor. The Senate should stop this political gamesmanship. We do not work for the Governor and grant his every request. We should not be rubber-stamp public servants of the administration.”
