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<\/a>Photo Caption SAN JUAN ANTIGUO, San Juan, Puerto Rico, May 21, 2020. Photo by Stephanie Klepacki on Unsplash<\/p>\n
Puerto Rico\u2019s non-voting Resident Commissioner in Congress, Pablo Jos\u00e9 Hern\u00e1ndez Rivera, (D-PR), introduced a new bill<\/a> on June 10 to address Puerto Rico\u2019s status as a U.S. territory. The day after the bill\u2019s introduction, Democrats, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY-14) and Rep. Nydia M. Vel\u00e1zquez (NY-7), Y),\u00a0issued<\/a>\u00a0the following joint statement opposing the status legislation:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cYesterday, the Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico co-opted our legislation and introduced a bill that includes an option to maintain the current status of the island as a colony. Over the last three congresses, more and more members have come to acknowledge that the current colonial condition of Puerto Rico is a moral stain on our nation\u2019s history that must be addressed. Our country cannot claim to be a bastion of democracy as we continue to hold colonies in the Caribbean and the Pacific.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The Hernandez bill calls for a plebiscite in Puerto Rico in which voters can choose from among four options: statehood, independence, independence with a Compact of Free Association, and \u201cCommonwealth.\u201d The bill argues that under \u201cthe current Commonwealth relationship,\u201d Puerto Rico \u201chas a measure of autonomy comparable to that possessed by the States.\u201d The bill additionally asserts that \u201cPuerto Rico exercises autonomy over fiscal and economic policy.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n In Puerto Rico v. Sanchez Valle (2016<\/a>),\u00a0the\u00a0U.S. Supreme Court Puerto Rico ruled that Puerto Rico does not enjoy a level of autonomy comparable to that of states like New York, nor does Puerto Rico exercise autonomy over its own fiscal and economic policy. The Court declared<\/a>\u00a0that Puerto Rico does not share in the States\u2019 \u201cpower, dignity, and authority\u201d and is not on \u201cequal footing\u201d with them.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n As the Supreme Court has stated and Congress has demonstrated, \u201cthe current Commonwealth relationship\u201d of Puerto Rico is not one of autonomy; there is no sovereignty. It is sometimes painful to acknowledge, but as Reps. Ocasio-Cortez and Vel\u00e1zquez attest, there is no denying \u201cthe colonial character of the Commonwealth.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By GENE ROMAN Photo Caption SAN JUAN ANTIGUO, San Juan, Puerto Rico, May 21, 2020. Photo by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":300709,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,9,24,63,129,131,130],"class_list":["post-300708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300708"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300708\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/300709"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}