Hysteria of Puerto Rican annexationists and autonomists in face of new electoral reality

For many years the leaders of Puerto Rican colonial parties have hoped that when elections approach, U.S. members of Congress from the Republican and Democratic parties would support their candidacies. One example was that of Chicago congressman Luis Gutiérrez, a Democrat and supporter of Puerto Rican independence, when he endorsed the autonomist candidate, Aníbal Acevedo Vila, for governor in 2004. Nothing happened. Puerto Rican politicians have also used Puerto Rican members of Congress to help obtain different economic aids that benefit the country in education, health, infrastructure, security, etc. In exchange, fundraising activities are carried out to help these members of Congress in their reelections.

Puerto Rico achieved — or was granted — a political status that did not have the characteristics of a classic colony, allowing the United States from having to inform the United Nations of Puerto Rico’s colonial status. For these purposes, a constitution was drafted, which had to be approved by the U.S. Congress which granted them the power to veto its articles, something that happened. It must be remembered that Puerto Rico is a territory that “belongs to, but is not part of, the United States.” It is the U.S. Congress that has total authority over Puerto Rico. The 1952 Constitution created the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico (ELA), a kind of euphemism whose real dependence has been proven in recent years by decisions of the Supreme Court, the Department of Justice and the United States Congress. The creation of the Fiscal Control Board by Congress in 2016 annulled what for many years was known as “the fiscal autonomy of the ELA,” one of the few powers that Puerto Ricans had.

As part of the constitution, the figure of Resident Commissioner was created, a kind of ambassador to Congress with the right to participate in all congressional committees, lobby congressmen for benefits of economic interest to Puerto Rico, and be able to vote in referendums on all legislative measures regarding Puerto Rico, AS LONG AS HIS VOTE WAS NOT DECISIVE.

During the 1990s, with the election of the Puerto Rican congressman for New York, José Serrano (1990), and the interest of Governor Rafael Hernández Colon (Autonomist) at the end of his third term, the young Puerto Rican Nydia Velásquez was appointed and supported to develop a massive movement of registration of Puerto Ricans in the voter registry of New York, with the purpose of increasing the Puerto Rican presence in the U.S. Congress. From there, Nydia Velásquez herself, and Luis Gutiérrez, from Chicago, were elected and more recently Alexandra Ocasio Cortez, one of the youngest figures elected to the US Congress and considered to be on the left wing of the Democratic Party; the young Darren Soto, Democrat for Florida, and the Republican Raul Labrado, who resigned from his position to run for governor of the state of Idaho, an election he lost in 2020.

This brief is recounted to reach a present day that has rapidly changed Puerto Rican politics since 2020. Following the results of the last elections, when the Puerto Rican Independence Party (PIP) and the Citizen Victory Movement, made up of independentists (those seeking total independence) not affiliated with the PIP, autonomists and annexationists, disenchanted with their respective parties, together obtained 28% of the votes, leaving the traditional parties, the New Progressive Party — PNP (Annexationist) with about 33% and the Popular Democratic Party — PPD (Autonomist) with barely 32%, parties that usually won elections with 45% or 50% of the votes. Despite the electoral restrictions from the 1940s onwards, which prohibited the coalition of political parties to go to elections, the prohibition was overcome, with each party committing to vote for specific candidates from one or the other party, ignoring the others. Hence, the candidate for governor will be Juan Dalmau of the Independence Party and Ana Irma Rivera Lassen of the Citizen Victory Movement for the Resident Commissioner in Washington. The other candidates will be distributed by municipalities, senators and representatives by accumulation and district.

The first symptom of these changes, in addition to the enthusiasm to go “United” and form “El Junte” for the first time in an election, would be the move to register and vote by an alliance of artists, composers and singers who played a prominent role in the calls to expel the elected governor, Ricardo Rosello, from the government for the first time in history, in the “Combative Summer” of 2019. In this group, René Pérez, known as “Residente”, and Benito Antonio Martínez, known as “El Conejo Malo” or “Bad Bunny”, stand out, both with their own economic resources — it is estimated that each one is worth no less than 50 million dollars — which has allowed them to place billboards all over the country, condemning corruption, attacking traditional parties and calling for change. The traditional parties are facing, for the first time, a political group with equal economic resources to compete in an election, when in the past they dominated almost all the resources. This was the first major confrontation: trying to prevent these fences from being put up and trying to discredit these artists, something that has been impossible, at least among young people.

The second symptom of these elections would be the weakening, and the possibility that the once powerful PPD (Autonomist) — founded by Luis Muñoz Marín, creator of the ELA — comes in third place in this election. On October 15, in an opinion article in the newspaper El Nuevo Dia, the candidate for Resident Commissioner in Washington for the PPD in the 2020 elections, Rafael Cox Alomar, called on the autonomists of the Popular Party to vote for change and the Alliance. Cox Alomar wrote: “They promised many things that they did not fulfill, including an electoral reform; they promised to fight for the University and they looted it; they promised to fight against corruption and they did not do it… Some harbor the doubt that voting for Dalmau would be treason… The only ones who have betrayed the Popular Party have been those who have most recently presided over it, always on their knees making common cause with the PNP.”

On this occasion, as in the previous one, there would be disqualifications and the attempt to downplay the statements of the one who was his candidate for Resident Commissioner in the last elections of 2020. The truth is that with these statements, coinciding comments were uncovered by political analysts and academics who were close to the Popular Party in the present and in the past. The idea of ​​the “Useful Vote” would be resurrected but in reverse: it was in the elections of 1985, when the then former governor and candidate for a second term for the PPD, Rafael Hernández Colon, called on the Independentists to vote for him, under the slogan, “Don’t throw away your vote, defend what is ours and overthrow Romero”, who was his opponent for the PNP in those elections. From there arose the derogatory term “Los Melones” (the Melons) to describe the Independentists who voted for the autonomists to avoid the triumph of the annexationists: “Green on the outside and red on the inside,” the colors of the PIP and the PPD. Now people are beginning to talk “on the down low” about voting for the Alliance to avoid the triumph of the annexationists.

The third novelty, perhaps not the last, for these elections was the presence in Puerto Rico of the congresswomen for New York, Nydia Velázquez and Alexandra Ocasio Cortez, who gave a press conference, first to endorse the candidacies of Juan Dalmau for governor and Ana Irma Rivera Lassen for resident commissioner, and other candidates of the Alliance. Secondly, the congresswomen would clarify that the fear campaigns launched against the Alliance are unfounded, that voting for Dalmau and Irma Lassen does not endanger relations with the United States, citizenship or federal aid. In addition, they are in the U.S. Congress to defend the rights of Puerto Ricans. As a final detail, they asked the federal government to ensure that electoral laws are not violated. Coincidentally, the following day, the head of the federal prosecutor’s office in Puerto Rico announced the appointment of an assistant federal prosecutor to ensure that irregularities do not occur in the electoral process.

In her own words, Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez said: “Today, face to face with the sun, I endorse Juan Dalmau for governor, Ana Irma Lassen for Resident Commissioner, Manuel Natal for mayor of San Juan and all the candidates of the Alliance. I will never abandon the struggles and causes of my country (Puerto Rico). We are here because Hope calls us,” ending with the expression “Puerto Rico neither surrenders nor sells out.” On the other hand, Representative Alexandra Ocasio Cortez said: “We have no more time to lose. The Alliance between the PIP and the MVC has shown us that there can be a Puerto Rico for all Puerto Ricans… today I am proud to support Juan Dalmau, for his leadership, Ana Irma Rivera Lassen, for a life of struggle, and Manuel Natal for Hope in the future.”

The reactions of the autonomists were not long in coming. Accusations of treason and ungratefulness rained down on the Popular Party, and in particular on the late Hernández Colon, alleging that he and his Party were responsible for making Nydia Velásquez’s political career in the U.S. Congress possible and, even more serious, for not supporting the candidacy of Pablo José Hernández, grandson of Rafael Hernández Colon, to be the Resident Commissioner in Washington. The annexationists would not be left behind, demanding non-interference in Puerto Rican internal affairs and demanding that the Independence Party ally itself with the colonizers, giving rise to a new terminology to describe the “ideology” of the Puerto Rican annexationists, “Statist Nationalism.”

The world seems upside down, but with Hope.