The chairman of the House Federal and Foreign Affairs Committee hopes that a unified stand among elected officials of the CNMI and Guam would convince the federal government to compromise on issues relating to cockfighting and the H-2B workers visa program.<\/p>\n
Rep. L.J. Castro (R-Saipan) met with members of the 35th Guam Legislature\u2014Speaker Tina Muna-Barnes and Sens. Amanda L. Shelton and Joe S. San Agustin\u2014in late January to talk about mutual concerns.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe had the chance to meet with [Guam lawmakers] in regards to coming up with a position on the ban on the H-2B workers [from the Philippines] as well as [Public Law 115-334], which include a cockfighting ban on territories,\u201d said Castro.<\/p>\n
P.L. 115-334 or the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, signed into law by President Donald Trump in December last year, bans cockfighting in all U.S. jurisdictions, including U.S. territories. Previous farm bills excluded U.S. territories from the ban.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know [P.L. 115-334] is an issue on both the municipal and central government side throughout the Marianas\u2014CNMI and Guam. We are addressing that and I have heard from [cockfighting] practitioners,\u201d said Castro. \u201cWhether be it through delegation legislation or through a resolution, we\u2019re looking at those avenues. It is something that being the [committee] chair that I\u2019m actively keeping an eye on.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said House Speaker B.J. Attao and some members of the CNMI Legislature are also keeping an eye on the issue<\/p>\n
He said that it is not only the CNMI and Guam but also Puerto Rico that are hoping to be exempted from the ban. \u201cThey must look at it from our standpoint, not just the CNMI and Guam but as far as Puerto Rico that also have a very active stance against it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was, I guess, a decision that we were not really consulted about. They kind of overlook, not only the cultural standpoint but also the economic side of it. Just like Puerto Rico, the CNMI stands to be affected from this.\u201d<\/p>\n
Castro said the Saipan Mayor\u2019s Office, which issues licenses and permits for cockfighting events, also wants the CNMI exempted from the ban. \u201cWe know how all the mayors stand on it. Another factor is we know how our neighbors in the south feel about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIn my capacity as chair, I touched base with my counterparts to see how we can address that. I know that we already took a stand with the H-2B issue and in the next session we will be acting on a [joint resolution] with the Senate on the [cockfighting] ban.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added that both the CNMI and Guam governments remain optimistic. \u201cI hope that, in working with our leaders, we can come to a resolution that would benefit us and hopefully have some compromise as well. We hope that our issues can [enlighten] the federal government [as to] how detrimental these decisions are.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The chairman of the House Federal and Foreign Affairs Committee hopes that a unified stand…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-293845","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=293845"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293845\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=293845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=293845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=293845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}