Amata’s amendments bill passes Senate, ready to be signed into law

Washington, D.C. — After final passage of Congresswoman Uifa’atali Amata’s bill for American Samoa, H.R. 6062, it will now be sent to President Biden to be signed into law.

The bill streamlines the enactment of amendments that have been approved by the people of American Samoa.

Congresswoman Amata is congratulating Governor Lemanu P.S. Mauga, as this was a priority for his administration, and sending special thanks to Senator Mazie Hirono (D-Hawai’i), who offered the bill up and spoke on the Senate floor for it.

The bill passed by Unanimous Consent with no objections.

“I’ve been in conversation with so many congressional leaders and influential senators this week to ensure a vote on our bill, and I want to thank each of them, but especially a heartfelt thanks to Senator Hirono who got our bill over the finish line,” said Congresswoman Aumua Amata. “Thank you in advance to President Biden, as we anticipate the bill will be signed into law sometime over the next ten working days.”

In addition to Senator Hirono’s essential help, numerous other Senators and Congressmen were supportive along the way. These included cosponsors Congressman James Moylan of Guam and Congressman Gregorio Kilili Camacho Sablan of CNMI. In the House process, Amata received support in the Natural Resources Committee from Chairman Bruce Westerman and Ranking Member Raúl Grijalva, Subcommittee Chair Harriet Hageman and Ranking Member Teresa Leger Fernández, as well as Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, Majority Leader Steve Scalise, and others.

The effort in the Senate was boosted by Chairman Joe Manchin, who recently stopped in American Samoa; Vice Chairman John Barrasso; Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, another senior senator and longtime friend; Subcommittee Chairman Ron Wyden; Vice Chairman James Risch, and others. Several key senior staff professionals for leading senators were also consistently helpful and involved. 

This self-determination bill, which fulfills the unanimous request by a Fono Resolution and Governor Lemanu P.S. Mauga to remove unnecessary steps, reaffirms the principle supporting American Samoa's right to self-determination. Under the change, the Interior Secretary can approve American Samoa’s constitutional amendments now and in the future without extra steps that other territories do not have.

Amata spoke on the House floor on July 9, when it was passed by the full House, and visited Senate proceedings throughout the effort. As a noncontroversial bill, it passed by unanimous consent every step of the way through committees and the House and Senate.

(Source: Congresswoman Uifa’atali Amata’s D.C. office)

BACKGROUND

Locally the bill has been opposed by local Swains Island Rep. Su’a Alex Jennings calling it a constitutional crisis for Swains Island. In an Ed Op, published in Samoa News in July 2024, Rep. Su’a noted that “Since 1983, no longer can the Secretary of the Interior, or a group of individuals make decisions that impact on our Constitution and right to self-determination, only an Act of Congress can do that.

“Some forty years later on October 25, 2023, Congresswoman Uifaatali, without the approval of the people of American Samoa and in violation of the Revised Constitution of American Samoa, introduced HR 6062 to repeal 48 U.S.C. 1662a and remove Congress from our Constitutional Amendment process, the one check and balance our forefathers had to put in place to prevent individual(s) from affecting our right to self-determination.”

In his Op Ed, the House representative contents that “a simple question that has gone unanswered, perhaps intentionally: is HR 6062 a product of self-determination?

“The members of the 2022 Constitutional Review Committee, the 2022 Constitutional Convention, nor the voters in the 2022 referendum ever expressed a desire to change the status quo and have known full-well the procedure for amending our constitution since 1983.”

He brings up also Congresswoman Uifaatali’s stance that the right to vote in the Fono for Swains Island violates the Constitution of the United States.” He states that “she further contends that HR 6062 protects American Samoa by granting the Department of the Interior the sole authority to approve amendments that violate the U.S. Constitution, by removing the requirements of a Congressional Review.”

However he notes that “it simply does not follow that if Congress cannot violate the U.S. Constitution that DOI should be able to. This is a dangerous precedent that surely won’t be looked upon favorably by the U.S. Senate.”

In her address to the bill when it passed the U.S. House of Representatives, Congresswoman Uifaatali pointed out that it’s important to note how the bill preserves the provision of the American Samoa constitution ratified in the 2022 amendment, which gives the delegate from Swain’s Island a right to vote. 

She stated, “Had the amendments been subjected to ratification by the U.S. Congress, the Swain's Island amendment likely would have failed to be affirmed due to the U.S. constitutional requirement for equal representation by population both in congress and state legislatures. 

“If the amendment had been considered by Congress, an early test would have been the provision granting a vote to the Swain's Island delegate,” said Uifaatali.

“There is no question that in hearings over the amendments, American Samoa government witnesses would have been asked how many people lived on Swain’s and, once the answer given would have been ‘none,’ that amendment would not have been approved, although other amendments might have been.

“Instead, we had a successful legislative hearing over my bill, not the specific amendments, and passage of this bill successfully prevents that concern.”