Workforce authors explain touchback

Statement

Marianas businesses should have flexibility when to send CW-1 workers home for the 30-day "touchback," required by the Northern Mariana Islands U.S. Workforce Act. Four of us, who were members of the bipartisan, bicameral working group that wrote the legislation, submitted comment to the Department of Homeland Security Monday to make clear touchback could occur at any time before submission of an application for a fourth year, "to fit the touchback period into the business cycle in a manner that best meets [businesses'] human resource needs." Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), Representatives Raúl Grijalva (D-Arizona) and Rob Bishop (R-Utah), and I made the joint submission as part of the formal rule-making process. The Act says the employer of a CW-1 worker, who has been in the Marianas for three years, may not apply for a fourth, one-year work permit, until the worker has been outside of the United States for a 30-day period, but the Department's Interim Final Rule is unclear on when this touchback must occur. The four of us, also, renewed our commitment to U.S. workers in the Marianas. Touchback, we wrote, "was intended to emphasize to employers the temporary nature of the Commonwealth-Only Transitional Worker (CW) program and further encourage that they hire U.S. workers, which is the underlying aim of the USWA." Read our comment here.