PALIKIR, Pohnpei On March 19th, 2021, His Excellency David W. Panuelo President of the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM) sent a letter to the Honorable Debra Anne Haaland, the newly confirmed and first Native American Secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI), requesting the FSM’s membership in the Western Interstate Commission on Higher Education (WICHE). The letter was sent as a response by the Vice Speaker of the U.S. Territory of Guam, the Honorable Tina Muña-Barnes, requesting DOI’s Office of Insular Affairs to consider funding the WICHE annual membership fee for the U.S.-affiliated Pacific Islands, including the FSM, with the purpose of demonstrating the Nation’s enthusiastic endorsement of that request.