AT a U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources hearing in Washington D.C. on Tuesday, U.S. Democratic Sen. Mazie Hirono of Hawaii inquired about the citizens of the Freely Associated States residing in the CNMI.
The FAS are the Republic of Palau, the Federated States of Micronesia, and the Republic of the Marshall Islands. These are independent nations that have Compacts of Free Association with the U.S.
Under the Compacts, eligible FAS citizens can migrate to the U.S. and its territories without visa and labor certification requirements.
“We each have high populations of citizens of the Freely Associates States residing in our respective jurisdictions,” Hirono said. “COFA citizens have been important members of society in Hawaii, Guam, and the Marianas for decades. However, certain financial provisions of the Compacts, including $30 million in Compact Impact funding, will expire in 2023. While it is widely recognized that Compact Impact funding is insufficient to cover the costs borne by our affected jurisdictions, how would Guam and the Marianas be affected if the U.S. government failed to extend Compact Impact funding past 2023, and fail to negotiate the Compacts of Free Associations before they expire in 2023 and 2024?” Hirono asked CNMI Finance Secretary David DLG Atalig who appeared on behalf of Gov. Ralph DLG Torres.
“We love our brothers and sisters [from the FAS] and we welcome them to our islands,” Atalig said. “However, we are aware that the current allocations for Compact Impact [are] very minimal and don’t even put a dent on the costs that we put to provide the services to the people who come and visit and stay in our islands…. [On] a similar note, without re-negotiation and more funding for the islands, it does put a burden [on the local] government services that we provide.”
Hirono then said, “I hope that finally restoring Medicaid eligibility to the Compact citizens…will have had a positive impact. We need to pretty much restore the capacity for them to be able to access other programs such as [the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance, or] SNAP, and all the other array of social programs. That’s what some of us are working on.”
She added, “Listening to your testimonies and the high cost of everything in the territories, I realize that a lot of the federal programs are administered differently or treated differently with regards to your territories, but one that I’m particularly interested in is how Medicaid is treated then, that you have a cap, because I believe that access to healthcare is a right, not a privilege, and so the fact that we have a cap placed on all of you in terms of Medicaid is something that I am going to look at… It will probably help all of you to have us lift that cap.”
In closing, the committee chair, Democrat Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, told the officials from the territories: “We want you all to succeed. We really do…. Maybe with this committee here, we’ll get a bipartisan letter asking the [U.S.] Treasury to give us an understanding of why they have not backed our territories with the full faith of the U.S. Treasury.”
The committee held the hearing to look into the state of the U.S. territories — the U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, American Samoa, Guam, and the Northern Marianas — amid the still raging Covid-19 global pandemic.
Mazie Hirono
