There’s a place in the United States where most US labor laws do not apply.
That place is the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI). With no legal protections for workers, immigrant women in the CNMI work in sweatshop conditions and, if they get pregnant, are sometimes forced by their employers to have abortions. That’s right, forced abortion. Again, and in all capital letters: FORCED ABORTION.
You might assume that the Republican Party — the party that has worked so hard to attract Christian conservative voters — would be doing everything in its power to protect these women.
You’d be wrong.
While Democrats (for example, California Congressman George Miller) have fought to apply US labor law to the Islands and to end the abuse of these workers, the Republican Party has fought to keep things as they are.
Why? Tom Delay explained the pro-business rationale behind the Republican Party’s immoral position on the issue, saying that the Islands served as a “perfect Petri dish of capitalism.” In addressing the Governor of the Islands, Delay famously said:
“You are a shining light for what is happening in the Republican Party, and you represent everything that is good about what we’re trying to do in America in leading the world in the free-market system.”
Now, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking: “Hey, that’s Tom Delay. He was an extremist. Now that he’s gone, I’m sure the Republican leadership will join with Democrats to put a stop to this horrible practice.” Wrong again. The GOP is still committed to maintaining the Islands as Petri dish of 19th Century capitalism, with no protections for these workers.
Many Americans have probably never heard of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, much less about the Republican experiments with these workers’ lives. The islands are near Guam, and were seized from the Japanese by US military forces during World War II. Today, they form a US Commonwealth. CNMI residents are U.S. citizens and, with some notable exemptions carved out by Congress, the islands are subject to U.S. law.