Asylum rules to apply in 2015, not 2014

Delegate Gregorio Kilili C. Sablan (Ind-MP) said yesterday that Jan. 1, 2015, is the correct date wherein the CNMI can start accepting asylum application—not Jan. 1, 2014 as he earlier told Saipan Tribune. He said the confusion results from a technical error in U.S. Public Law 110-229, the law that placed CNMI immigration under federal control, which states that asylum application is not permitted “before Jan. 1, 2014.”

Federal rule later stated “no application for asylum may be filed prior to Jan. 1, 2015.”

Sablan made the clarification about his earlier statement at yesterday’s meeting of the Saipan Chamber of Commerce, wherein he was one of the guest speakers. 

Attorney Maya Kara asked Sablan during the Chamber meeting about the asylum issue, and that’s when Sablan made the clarification.

Just the same, Sablan later said, the CNMI would work with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to ensure that the asylum provision exemption will also be extended if the federalization transition period is extended beyond 2014.

Thus, if the transition period ending Dec. 31, 2014, is extended by five years, then the CNMI would request that the asylum exemption be extended also up to Dec. 31, 2019.

“We have reached out to agencies and other members of Congress in exploring, or attaching the exemption of the asylum provision, to become effective upon the termination of the transition period so that if the transition period is extended, then the asylum issue is also extended,” he said in an interview.

Sablan said the asylum issue is one “that we have to build agreement with DHS before we even move forward.”

He said DHS’ agreement to the idea is “critical.”

“And I can say that I’ve been looking at this for quite some time, with much greater attention this year,” he added.

PL 110-229 isolated the CNMI from the rest of the United States with respect to applications for asylum. 

In Section 702(j) of this law, it states “Nothing in this subsection shall be construed to authorize or require any person described in section 208(e) to be permitted to apply for asylum under section 208 at any time before Jan. 1, 2014.”

“The law still states Jan. 1, 2014, and this is causing confusion. DHS said the proper date is Jan. 1, 2015, and the Jan. 1, 2014, is a technical error,” Sablan said.

Another portion of PL 110-229 says that Section 208 (asylum) of the Immigration and Nationality Act “shall not apply during the transition period to persons physically present in the Commonwealth or arriving in the Commonwealth…” but did not specify a date.

It’s been seven months since Sablan and Gov. Eloy S. Inos jointly wrote a letter to the Obama administration, asking for an extension of the CNMI’s exemption from accepting asylum applications, thinking that the exemption would expire Jan. 1, 2014.

Without anything to delay the exemption, the CNMI has to abide by law, Sablan had said.

The CNMI is concerned that allowing the law’s provision on asylum to apply as scheduled would open the floodgates for asylum seekers coming here as tourists, including under a U.S. visa waiver program that could also potentially derail the parole program for Chinese and Russian tourists, among other things.

An equally serious concern is catching the ire of the Chinese government, which could pull the plug on airlines servicing the China-CNMI route and could hurt the islands’ tourism numbers. 

In the past, most applicants for refugee protection and asylum, for example, were from China. They claimed they would be persecuted or killed for political reasons if they are sent back to China.

Tourists from China and Russia can stay in the CNMI for up to 45 days without being required to secure a U.S. visa—a DHS program that has helped boost the islands’ tourism numbers.