Audit · Sept. 10, 2026
FY2023 single-audit summary flags $96.95 million in questioned federal costs.
Marianas Press reported that a CNMI Single Audit Committee summary of the FY2023 audit identified approximately $96.95 million in questioned federal costs across major programs. Questioned costs are not automatically proof of theft; they can arise from missing support, noncompliance, grant-condition failures or other audit exceptions. Scale and documentation failures remain matters of public accountability.
Source: Marianas Press ↗
Executive succession · Sept. 10–11, 2026
Acting-governor succession immediately became an exercise of executive authority.
With Governor David Apatang and Lt. Governor Dennis Mendiola off-island, Senate President Karl R. King-Nabors said Article III, Section 8(a) made him acting governor. Reporting the next day said King-Nabors terminated DPS Commissioner Anthony Macaranas. Governor Apatang later disputed the reported date of his departure while describing the Guam trip as official business.
Constitution · Sept. 8, 2026
Why is the constitutional-convention question absent from the ballot?
Former OAG special prosecutor James Kingman publicly questioned why voters have not been presented with the periodic constitutional-convention question, saying the Constitution requires it. The issue belongs on a document-driven track: constitutional text, prior ballot history, CEC position, and any formal legal interpretation.
Source: Marianas Press ↗
Election administration
Source-control rule: certified roster beats stale roster.
CEC currently exposes a certified 74-entry candidate listing and an older page showing 78. CNMI Politics uses the certified listing. Its public results endpoint also contains vote totals before Election Day; those figures are quarantined as test/preloaded data until actual election reporting begins.
See source register and methodology →