releases: http://sablan.house.gov/press-release/house-okays-extension-asylum-bar-h-visa-exemption-investor-visa
Data license: MIT · Data source: dwillis/congress-press
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| http://sablan.house.gov/press-release/house-okays-extension-asylum-bar-h-visa-exemption-investor-visa | House okays extension of asylum bar, H visa exemption, investor visa | 2014-12-13 | 2014 | 2014-12 | Independent | Senate | MP | Gregorio Sablan | S001177 | sablan.house.gov | legacy | H.R.83, with my language extending critical immigration policies in the Northern Mariana Islands for another five years, is now the vehicle for funding the federal government for fiscal year 2015. The House approved the bill 219 to 206 late Thursday night and the Senate is expected to act over the weekend. The White House says the President will sign the measure. If enacted, H.R.83 will continue three policies set to expire on December 31. The first, exemption from the national cap on the number of H visas will enable big construction projects like Best Sunshine to bring in short-term workers. The second, the E-2C investor visa, will allow 261 foreign investors, who entered the NMI under the Commonwealth’s own immigration law, to stay another five years. The third, continuing the bar on claims of asylum from our islands, will secure the parole policy that allow tourists from China and Russia to enter the NMI visa free. Without this bar the Congressional Budget Office estimated that the U.S. would have to spend $16 million dealing with asylum claims. This week’s action is the result of two years of work. I first included the necessary language in my bill, H.R.2200, and in its companion, S.1237, which got a hearing in 2013 and passed the Senate this June. I also introduced the language in H.R.4296, which the House Natural Resources Committee okayed in May. In September, Senator Lisa Murkowski agreed to add my language to H.R. 83, dealing with insular energy policy, when that bill passed the Senate. Procedural requirements then made the five-page H.R.83 a convenient vehicle for the additional 1,603 pages needed to appropriate $1.1 trillion for fiscal 2015. So in an historical first an insular area bill is poised to fund most of the federal government for the year. I am very grateful to Congresswoman Donna Christensen (D – Virgin Islands), who wrote the original H.R.83, to Senator Murkowski (R – Alaska), and to Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer (Maryland), who took a special interest in making sure my language passed the House. I also want to thank Governor Eloy Inos, who understood the economic importance of extending these immigration policies and made his views known to the Speaker of the House, John Boehner. | 1 | 2026-03-30T12:14:52Z | 2026-03-30T12:14:52Z |