Kilili: Agenda shift is inevitable

Some of Delegate Gregorio Kilili C. Sablan’s plans in his fourth two-year term as the CNMI’s nonvoting representative to U.S. Congress will have to change, now that the Republican Party controls both the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate.

However, Sablan, an independent who caucuses with Democrats in the House, assured that he has no trouble working with GOP lawmakers as his record in the past six years could attest.

“Of course, with the Republicans in complete control of Congress, the opportunities to advance any of my agenda items will shift. But I have built up a pretty good set of relationships with Republicans over the last six years. I wouldn’t have been able to get seven Republican chairmen to visit our islands this August if I didn’t have some friends on that side of the aisle. We have also built up a very solid working relationship with Sen. [Lisa] Murkowski, the incoming Republican chair of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, which has jurisdiction over insular affairs. So I am not troubled by the change in party leadership.”

Sablan, who defeated NMI Democratic Party’s Andrew Salas in the Nov. 4 elections, said his to-do list for the 114th United States Congress would also have to be updated because many have already been fulfilled.

“We have taken some things off the agenda because they are done: we got ownership of our submerged lands enacted into law; we got the SNAP [Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program] pilot program enacted, putting us on the pathway to equality with the States on food assistance,” he said.

As he prepares for the opening of the next Congress in January, Sablan said his agenda would continue to focus on three important issues: education, immigration, and the regional military buildup.

“But the core of my agenda remains the same: improving federal support for education in the Northern Mariana Islands so our people have the skills needed for jobs in our economy, working to make the immigration transition as least difficult as possible, making sure that we get the same kind of help with healthcare as other parts of America, and, increasingly, managing the military buildup in our islands to maximize the benefits and minimize potentially damaging effects.”

Whether the Republicans or the Democrats have control of Congress, Sablan said he would continue to advance the CNMI’s interests at the House.

“The reality is that we have been successful in improving life in the Marianas under Democratic leadership in Congress and under Republican leadership. We try to keep our issues nonpartisan, which is why I like being an independent. That seems to work and that will continue to be my approach.”

Sablan left the CNMI yesterday and is en route to Washington, D.C., to resume his work in the final days of the 113th Congress.