Amata Highlights Indo-Pacific Hearing, Coast Guard Appropriations Progress
Busy Week of Votes and Hearings in Congress
Washington, D.C. – Congresswoman Uifa’atali Amata is highlighting a busy week of votes, including Committee of the Whole votes on the House floor, several hearings, a grant for American Samoa, and inclusion of her requested regional priorities for the Coast Guard in the 2025 appropriations legislation.
Assistant Secretary Kritenbrink and Congresswoman Amata conversing while the hearing was not in session crop
On Thursday, Amata took part in a hearing on the topic of “Properly Resourcing the Indo-Pacific in an Era of Great Power Competition” in the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on the Indo-Pacific. The Subcommittee is chaired by Congresswoman Young Kim of California, and Congresswoman Amata serves as Vice Chairman. Witnesses were Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel Kritenbrink, and USAID Assistant Administrator for Asia Michael Schiffer.
The hearing is available HERE with Congresswoman Amata’s statement and questions beginning at mark 1:03:10, in which she asked how the administration is promoting investment in the region while protecting fishing.
In response, Assistant Secretary Kritenbrink emphasized the importance of the region to stability and security, noted the presence of two new U.S. embassies and two more underway, and said the U.S. is “meeting our Pacific Islands friends where they live” in taking on their 2050 Blue Pacific priorities. “We believe when our partners succeed, we succeed,” he said.
Congresswoman Amata and Assistant Secretary Kritenbrink at this week's hearing
Additionally, Congresswoman Amata asked Assistant Administrator Schiffer about USAID’s efforts to improve connectivity and add undersea cables in the Pacific. He noted their work with two cables in Palau and Micronesia, and highlighted a Digital Connectivity Partnership with the University of the South Pacific.
$3 Million Transportation Grant for Port
Amata is welcoming USDOT’s award of $3 million for Pago Pago Harbor port improvements, as announced this week. The congressional underpinnings of this grant are based in the November 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, officially the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), which Amata supported throughout its consideration in Congress. While Congress empowers federal agencies with discretion in distributing funds, such grants come from Congress in two steps, as funding must be authorized in legislation that generally covers one to five years, and then must be appropriated in the yearly appropriations bills. Once the federal agency determines the specifics of a grant, under the longstanding tradition in Washington, they then notify Congress on their use of congressional appropriations.
Amata’s Coast Guard Efforts Advance
The 2025 Homeland Security Appropriations bill includes an Amendment sponsored by Congresswoman Amata stepping up Coast Guard presence in the Pacific, and three other measures on which she led the requests to the Chairman with bipartisan support.
Amata’s amendment, which passed and is part of the bill, provides a key increase of $1.65 million to Coast Guard, Operations and Support, to fund the Indo-Pacific Planning and Communications project that would provide fleet liaisons, a regional public affairs team, and country clearance team, supporting increased Coast Guard presence in the region, along with the Coast Guard’s ability to transfer cutters to partner nations, bolstering critical regional partnerships.
Amata’s three additional requests included are:
- $335 million dollars for 4 Fast Response Cutters to increase deployments in the Pacific;
- $60 million dollars for a service life extension to enable the Coast Guard to deploy another Medium Endurance Cutter to the Pacific; and
- $4.2 million dollars for increased maritime engagements to expand partnerships and exercise bilateral and multi-lateral agreements in the Indo-Pacific.
2025 Appropriations Update
This week, the Appropriations Committee’s various Subcommittees marked up and advanced the second tranche (a group of bills) of appropriations bills for Fiscal Year 2025, while several of the year’s appropriations bills passed the House. Work will continue for the remaining appropriations bills following the Fourth of July holiday. More announcements will be made regarding these bills and their impact in American Samoa as they proceed through Congress. Earlier in the week, Amata announced the Transportation Appropriations bill includes her request to Committee of $1 million for Pago Pago International Airport terminal, a project request from Governor Lemanu Mauga’s administration as part of the Community Project Funding process in Congress.
NOAA Hearing
Also on Thursday, Amata took part in a legislative hearing of the Natural Resources Committee’s Subcommittee on Water, Wildlife and Fisheries, examining four bills related to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), including consideration of reauthorization of programs that support NOAA’s research to protect coastal communities and estuarine reserves, and a reform requiring NOAA to develop a standing committee with the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine to encourage better management decisions to improve stock assessments and recreational fisheries data collection.
VA Health Hearing
On Wednesday, Amata took part in a hearing of the Veterans’ Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on Health assessing challenges in VA’s current VISN (Veterans Integrated Service Networks) structure, and inconsistencies in provided care to Veterans due to location, titled “The Continuity of Care: Assessing the Structure of VA’s Healthcare Network.”
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