Gregorio Sablan: “Today, many children are prevented from reaching their full potential because they are suffering from the significant…”

Today is, indeed, a very important day, historic in some ways, because it marks the beginning of what I hope and I believe will be a successful bipartisan effort to renew the financial provisions of the Compacts of Free Association.

I want to commend Chairman Westerman and Ranking Member Grijalva for creating this Indo-Pacific Task Force to provide for a bipartisan process.

Renewing the financial provisions of the Compact is essential to our nation's security posture in the Indo-Pacific region.

There is no easy way that our nation will be able to maintain our influence in what is becoming an increasingly strategic, important, and contested area of the world without continuing our partnership with the COFA nations