© Provided by Washington Examiner Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are usually political opposites. But they're aligned on one issue: Puerto Rico statehood.
McConnell, a senator from Kentucky, is aligned with a faction of Republicans in Congress that opposes statehood for the Caribbean island, which a bipartisan group of lawmakers is trying to make happen through the Puerto Rico Statehood Admission Act that was introduced in the House this week. In McConnell's view, making Puerto Rico a state would deliver a Democratic representative and two additional Democratic senators, comparable to the Democratic push to make Washington, D.C., a state.
Ocasio-Cortez, the far-left Democratic congresswoman from New York, has her own reasons for skepticism about Puerto Rico statehood. It's not a given that Puerto Rico would be a Democratic stronghold, she noted.
The island currently sends to Washington "a representative, a delegate, that caucuses with the Republican Party," Ocasio-Cortez told the Washington Examiner, in reference to Jenniffer Gonzalez Colon, who is the resident commissioner of Puerto Rico. "I'd hope that no one is supporting this out of a partisan basis or under the assumption that this would yield Democratic votes. But if there is anyone that is doing that, I think it's important to remind them that that assumption may not be a sound one," she said.
That has both parties playing a political game of chicken with Puerto Rico's statehood aspirations. Each party is divided on the issue, with a faction of people in each convinced that Puerto Rico's admission as a state would help their rivals in future elections.
There's also plenty of opposition to statehood in Puerto Rico. Three former Puerto Rican governors, Sila Calderon, Alejandro Garcia-Padilla, and Anibal Acevedo Vila (all members of the island's Popular Democratic Party, which supports keeping Puerto Rico a U.S. territory), sent a letter to President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris last month advocating their position.
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"Statehooders have sought the support from liberals by framing statehood as a civil rights issue," the trio of former governors wrote. "By denying it to Puerto Ricans, their argument goes the U.S. is denying them equality. But given the ebbs and flows of public opinion, the minimal majority of 52% obtained by statehood option allows for only one indisputable conclusion: that the people of Puerto Rico are divided on this issue."
As an alternative to statehood, a group of House Republicans and Democrats say that the island should decide its own political status. The Puerto Rico Self-Determination Act of 2020 calls for a "status convention" for the people of Puerto Rico to determine their own future. Additionally, the bill does not advocate for one status to decide the island's future like the competing bill offering Puerto Rico admission for statehood.
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Puerto Rican voters would elect a group of delegates to review the island's status issue and create a proposal that includes solutions such as statehood, independence, or a free association.
"What I would ask, at least from my colleagues, even within the Democratic Party, is to, at the very least, respect the principle of the fact that a colonizing nation should not be determining the status of one of their colonies for them. And that we should have a rigorous process of self-determination," Ocasio-Cortez told the Washington Examiner. "And if that process yields in the result of statehood, then so be it, but we cannot be determining status for entities for people. That is not justice."
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer received a letter from more than 80 activist organizations in 16 states and Puerto Rico asking them to pass the bill that Ocasio-Cortez and Democratic Rep. Nydia Velazquez, both progressives and of Puerto Rican heritage, co-authored together.
Still, Puerto Rican statehood advocates got a head start on their political opponents this week. Puerto Rico Gov. Pedro Pierluisi traveled to Washington earlier in the week to push the Puerto Rico statehood bill, along with Gonzalez Colon and Florida Democratic Rep. Darren Soto.
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Last November, during the U.S. presidential election, a nonbinding referendum in Puerto Rico showed that 52.52% of voters on the U.S. island territory voted "yes" for statehood. Six referendum votes have happened since 1967.
However, Velazquez noted in another interview that the referendum was conducted by Puerto Rico's pro-statehood New Progressive Party and that it was "a political trick to entice people to come out to the polls." She added that Pierluisi notified her previously that he would be in Washington pushing the statehood effort.
Tags: News, Congress, Puerto Rico, Statehood, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Nydia Velazquez, Jenniffer Gonzalez, Mitch McConnell
Original Author: Kerry Picket
Original Location: Puerto Rico statehood is game of chicken between GOP and Democrats