There have been six referendums on Puerto Rico’s status. Three of those referendums happened in the last ten years.
In the 2020 referendum, 52% of Puerto Ricans voted to become a state and 47% voted against.
Democrats and their media, obsessed with rigging the senate by adding two senators, hailed this narrow victory as a clear mandate for statehood.
It’s actually a near split with a mere difference of 60,000 votes.
Compare that to the Alaska statehood referendum which passed by 83% or the Hawaii referendum which cleared by a somewhat more modest 68% but still hit the 2 to 1 mark.
House Democrats, with the complicity of a few of the worse Republicans, managed to pass the Puerto Rico Status Act. The bill only states that it must pass with a “majority of the valid votes.”
That’s not a reference to voter fraud, but to the 2017 referendum in which statehood won by 97%, but only because everyone who didn’t support statehood boycotted the referendum, and the 2012 referendum in which there were 500,000 blank ballots submitted as a protest.
(Puerto Rico’s statehood referendums are as dysfunctional as the territory itself.)
A serious statehood referendum for Puerto Rico would at least ask for a 2 to 1 majority. Democrats will however be perfectly happy if they win a referendum by the population of a square mile of Manhattan, even if it’s against the will of nearly half of Puerto Ricans.
And they call this “decolonization”.
Plenty of Hawaiians resent the United States, but they still want to be part of it. Puerto Ricans would like the benefits of citizenship while maintaining political independence from America.
That’s the so-called ‘commonwealth’ option.
The Puerto Rico Status Act lists three options on the referendum, ‘Independence’, ‘Sovereignty in Free Association with the United States’ and ‘Statehood’. Sovereignty or Commonwealth would allow Puerto Rico to make treaties with foreign nations and still retain our citizenship.
The model for this is the British Commonwealth and its former colonies in the region.
But America isn’t a monarchy. We don’t have a king who is going to formally be Puerto Rico’s monarch even as it signs treaties with Communist China. Nor do we have some obsessive need to prop up an outdated empire by having a bunch of third world countries acknowledge Charles III or Biden I. A commonwealth status for Puerto Rico has no constitutional basis at all.
That hasn’t stopped Pelosi and House Democrats from passing such a bill anyway. And 16 Republicans, who probably barely even read it or understood it, from voting for it anyway.
Putting both the commonwealth and independence on the ballot is supposed to split the nationalist vote and allow statehood proponents to get their bare majority. But as clever as Pelosi and House Democrats think they are, Puerto Rican politics has been based in no small part over debating this issue for generations and suspecting every referendum of being rigged.
The nationalists will accept nothing short of independence. And their terrorists remain heroes to many. Especially New York City’s Puerto Rican politicians. Commonwealth supporters keep arguing about what their imaginary ideal of an impossible relationship looks like. And statehood proponents can only hope to carve out a narrow referendum victory that, if past history is any guide, will be preemptively sabotaged by everyone else who disagrees with them.
Puerto Rico is much too dysfunctional to manage statehood or much of anything else. Anyone who has watched the aftermath of natural disasters play out has seen a little of how broken and corrupt its governmental structures are. And the only real argument statehood proponents have is that with two senators they’ll be able to wrangle a lot more money to go to Puerto Rico.
That much is undeniably true. Puerto Rico has the example of multiple broken cities across America whose citizens don’t work for a living, they vote for a living, and whose politicians exist to trade support for cash. But most Puerto Ricans also know that all that money will, like the massive amounts of aid after every hurricane, find their way into the pockets of politicians.
There will be little left over to improve life for ordinary people.
But Puerto Rico is also so broken that there may be no choice. It exited bankruptcy this summer after its debt was cut by 80% without fixing any of the issues. It has a 44% poverty rate and 60% are on Medicare or Medicaid. Crime is high. The murder rate is four times that of America.
There are more Puerto Ricans living in the United States than there are back home.
Statehood has no purpose except to give Democrats two senate seats and inject even more money into what is already the most corrupt place around. “9th mayor in Puerto Rico this year accused of corruption” is how a typical AP headline sums up the state of affairs.
Responsible officials and activists in Puerto Rico are trying to clean up some of the mess. They have little interest in yet another referendum that isn’t going to do anything about the real problems. They would rather maintain the status quo as a territory without another bout of infighting over proposals that serve no one except fanatics and the politically corrupt.
Democrats are obsessed with statehood for Puerto Rico and Washington D.C., not because they care about either place, but because they have a road map for rigging the senate. And while there’s no doubt that D.C. statehood would lead to two Democrat bloc votes that would be as corrupt as they would be loyal, Puerto Rico’s politics are a whole lot more complicated.
Puerto Ricans were supposed to help turn Florida blue, but Gov. DeSantis won 56% of the Puerto Rican vote. And back home, Puerto Rico is more conservative than the Puerto Ricans living in the United States. Puerto Rico’s legislature has been moving on abortion bans Judge Juan Perez-Gimenez, a Carter appointee, kept on fighting the Supreme Court’s gay marriage position in two decisions, longer than most other federal judges. On a variety of social issues, Puerto Rico is more socially conservative than almost all Democrat areas in the United States.
But, despite the attempts to align the country’s parties with Democrats and Republicans in America, or our political movements, Puerto Rico is not America. Its politics and worldview fit within the culture of the region. Puerto Ricans have their distinct identity and want to be who they are. The current status quo is the best of a bad bargain that would either try to merge a foreign failed state into America or give it the independence to fail on its own.
Puerto Ricans have failed to provide any kind of enthusiastic support for statehood across six disastrous referendums. The two most legitimate referendums in the 90s, which had the highest turnout, stalemated when voters chose the status quo or commonwealth over statehood.
Much like the EU, Democrats want to keep Puerto Ricans voting until they vote their way.
Democrats are attempting to force a narrow victory that they can use to drag Puerto Rico into the United States, even if 48% of the population is opposed, for their own political power. Whatever the outcome, much of Puerto Rico will view it as an illegitimate conspiracy. And they will react accordingly. Puerto Rico can only ever become an unwilling and hostile state.
After the history of Puerto Rican political terrorism, which included an assassination attempt on President Truman, there’s little doubt that Democrats know this and don’t care. All they can see is the possibility of two free senate seats. But most Americans and Puerto Ricans should care.
Democrats claim that they want to ‘decolonize’ Puerto Rico, but what they actually want to do is colonize it. And that’s why plenty of Puerto Ricans remain hostile to their proposal.
Puerto Rico doesn’t want to be America, it wants to be Puerto Rico.
The latest referendum push is a bad idea that America and Puerto Rico are better off without.
This is clearly designed to ensure a Democratic majority
Just like “Motor Voter,” same day registration, mail in balloting, an election season rather than an Election Day, opposition to voter ID laws, you name it. Their one and only value is obtaining and maintaining power.
Yeah, based on my limited experience with them (think AOC and worse), don’t want them as a state.
My theory is that their long history as a Spanish colony corrupted them, etc.
The article mentions both PR and DC. Others are more knowledgeable about the technical particulars of each locality than I, so I will leave the ‘nuts and bolts’ of resolving these two issues to them. But the larger issue of these two places to me is this: Republicans almost never take the initiative and act proactively. Republicans seem to almost always be playing ‘catch up.’ As Benjamin Franklin famously said: “Madam, you have a Republic, if you can keep it.” Republicans had better start ‘thinking ahead’ and stop trying to merely react to the D’rats’ latest political scheme to gain power, or we will lose our Republic to the Marxists.
Didn’t that already happen? Talk about catch up
I agree.
Let’s try and split off conservative parts of Canada and make them states. Or do some seasteading or orbital colonies to add states.
I’ve been a life long advocate of Puerto Rico independence. Of course now that Communism is no longer an internationalist ideology, why not? The Cold War is over.
We should give Puerto Rico its independence and they can vote all they want for whatever they want. Cutting the ties should be our decision and ours only. With respect and best wishes “Viva Puerto Rico libre y Soberano!”
I agree.
Yes, sir, your spot on Puerto Rico Shouldn’t Be a State. A corrupt PR governmental system and corrupt Democratic party and some Republicans. Being ethnic Puerto Rican hope and pray it does not happen. What benefit can there be for US and PR except to line the pockets of corrupt bureaucracy.
Unfortunately that’s exactly the intended benefit.
I lived in Puerto Rico until 1974 and have been there many times since on business and to visit friends. Mr. Greenfield’s analysis is spot on. Most of my friends there do not support statehood. Corruption is very high and it’s government bloated and ineffective. If it became a state, it would become a bottomless money vacuum. I hate to say it because I’m very fond of Puerto Rico and their people, but independence is best for the United States.
Thank you for sharing your experiences. I feel like there’s more support for statehood in America than Puerto Rico.
Looking back, maybe we didn’t win the Spanish/American war. We got Puerto Rico for winning. Looks like a booby prize. We should have given it back to them in the 1950s when they wanted it.
We also got the Phillipines, and Cuba, more booby prizes for “winning” the Spanish/American War 🙂
Psychologically, that was an overly ambitious, aggressive, and optimistic period in American history, and we are paying for it now. Like the UK is paying for the British Empire period, being overrun by the backwash of immigrants from the former colonies.
You’re generalizing sir. Everyone who wants Puerto Rico to become a state is not a Democrat. I sure as hell am not. And as you said Puerto Rico is very socially conservative, so even though they vote Democrat and would give the party two seats, they wouldn’t elect a liberal/left candidate or support said policies. They would be DINO state. The polls seem to show that Puerto Rico statehood is supported by a majority of the island’s residents. I think that joining the Union would fix many of the problems you mention like corruption and poverty. I also believe that Puerto Rican’s need full representation in American politics by being allowed to elect and vote. This website goes more into detail: pr51st.com
I’m totally opposed to DC statehood, that is just a power grab! And the city wouldn’t be called Columbia anymore! Speaking of which, Puerto Rico has the world’s biggest Columbus statue, and it has never been vandalized. I think a place full of people who haven’t swallowed leftist agitprop about the Genoese grandfather of America would be a great addition to the U.S!
I lived in PR for 5 years back in the 80’s. I know that place very well. Get anybody who favors statehood two beers and he’s anti-statehood. They are proud to be Puerto Ricans and they do not want to be called Americsns.
Good point about repeating the elections over and over until they get the result they want.
The twist is, one result (stay as is, Commonwealth) allows the election to be repeated at a later date, while the other result (statehood) is final, once Puerto Rico becomes a state, that’s it, no more elections on that issue.
So the Democrats only have to win once, the opposition has to win every time. The odds are that eventually the opposition is going to fail (exponential odds in favor of the Democrats).
There are other election scenarios that are also exponential in favor of one side, for example if a county in Oregon or California wants to secede, they have to jump through a series of hurdles, winning every time, whereas if they fall at one hurdle, that’s the end of it.
So we can add the exponential trick to the ways of rigging the election, how many people would even understand that, or what I just said?