Workers in the Mariana Islands will receive the protection of U.S. labor law under a bill signed Thursday by President Bush. Debate over whether to extend federal labor and immigration law to the Marianas, in the northwestern Pacific, had been sullied by reports of sweatshop labor and past associations with the lobbying scandal surrounding Jack Abramoff, whose firm was hired by the islands to oppose the changes. The measure, approved by Congress last month, creates a federally run guest-worker program in the U.S. Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, which includes Saipan and 13 other islands north of Guam. It also gives the commonwealth a delegate in the House with limited voting powers.
See "Bush signs bill extending US labor, immigration law to Mariana Islands", Matthew Daly, Minneapolis Star Tribune, May 7, 2008