USA Green Card Immigration Blog

An announcement was made by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s on November 27, 2009 regarding immigration laws of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI.) The announcement states that the immigration laws of CNMI will be replaced by the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) and other U.S. immigration laws on November 28, 2009. This new amendment eases restrictions and provides new privileges to CNMI residents who wish to live and work in the United States.

In order to address key changes under the Consolidated Natural Resources Act, five new transition rules were published in the Federal Register in the year 2009. They are listed below:

• The U.S. Customs and Border Protection issued a rule on the Guam-CNMI Visa Waiver Program extending the admission period from 15 days to 45 days. The geographic area has also been extended from Guam-only to Guam and the CNMI. The list of eligible countries and geographical areas has also been modified.

• USCIS has opened an Application Support Center (ASC) at TSL Plaza in Saipan to provide biometric services including fingerprint capture, photographs, and signature. They also provide other services like naturalization and adjustment of status interviews and answer questions on immigration to the public.

• USCIS has published a proposed rule that created CNMI-specific nonimmigrant investor visa classification known as “E-2 CNMI Investor” status. This status allows CNMI investors to remain in CNMI for a transition period under the “E-2 CNMI Investor” status. They can enter and exit CNMI with E-2 CNMI Investor visas.

• USCIS has also published an interim rule that classifies Transitional Worker visa during the transition period. Alien workers, who have performed services for an employer, but were ineligible for other INA classifications were allowed to receive nonimmigrant visa classification.

• USCIS and the Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review published an interim rule to revise immigration rules to implement the new laws applying to CNMI.