I say it’s about time they become a State in the Union. They should join us as equals.

It has absolutely nothing in common with the other 49 and the “native” Hawaiians, first class pains in the butt, want it back.

As for PR, give them their independence.

to Puerto Rico multiple times, and I can tell you that they are ready for statehood. In case you don’t know, Puerto Ricans overwelmingly voted in the New Progressive Party in a super majority in 08. Despite the name, the majority of NPP members are also members of the Republican Party of the United States. NPP favors going for statehood. The people I talked with down there all, well, most of them favor statehood, and believe its been a long time in coming.

I guess I am a little excited about this because I am an expansionist, and have been advocating that Puerto Rico be added as a state.

On the political side, Puerto Rico is assuredly a red state, and will remain in the Republican column. A little bonus for us conservatives.

While admitting PR as a state would add to the budget, they would also be taxed like the other states. To insinuate that adding PR as a state would “cost” the government money without having the facts to back it up goes against the spirit of your post.

Also, what is the problem with PR having two official languages? As long as English is one of them I’m not sure where the issue is.

Representative Hastings: Thanks for posting here. I appreciate reading your thoughts on this. One thing I’d like to point out is that PR becoming a State would actually save the federal government millions of dollars in the long run. As it is now, PR residents are eligible for all federal programs, and the territorial government even receives monies equivilent to many States. However, because PR is not a State, residents do not have to be federal income tax, register for the draft, or a number of other basic obligations of U.S. citizens. In short, they have all the priveledges (except voting in general elections) yet none of the responsibilities.

@ Tbone: PR doesn’t want independence. Neither does Hawaii.

Personally, I’d love to see Puerto Rico become a State… but it should enter with another to keep the “balance of power” since, honestly, most of their congressmen would end up being firmly Democratic for as far as we can project. All but 2 of the last 12 States to join the Union have been admitted within only a few months of each other, in part to maintain the partisan balance.

The ideal pair candidate for PR is Cuba, but with our current administration, they would never be offered a chance even if they begged for it.

Until English is the official language of Puerto Rico, I would never work for its acceptance as a state.

My name is Randy Haddock. I was born and raised in Puerto Rico, lived for a few years in Florida and now I live in New York City. I am a conservative and a strong supporter of statehood for Puerto Rico. I have been my whole life.

The fight for statehood is about equality. We Puerto Ricans are born Americans yet we are not allowed to vote for the President or have voting representation in Congress. Basically, we are second-class Americans. As soon as I moved to the continental US, my voting rights were magically given to me. I was suddenly able to vote for the President and be represented in Congress. These rights, afforded to us by the US constitution, should be extended to every single American, including those born in Puerto Rico. And it pains me to think that my fellow Puerto Ricans back in the Island do not have the same rights as I do, merely because of my geographical location.

Democrats have historically opposed statehood and The Republican Party has been a strong ally to Puerto Rico in its fight for statehood. Our party has been the one to stand up for true equality. Those fighting for independence in Puerto Rico are a very small leftist fringe.

Puerto Rico is ready for equality. Won’t you join us in that battle?

send in the National Guard to get rid of the drug lords, and open up the beaches to resorts.

Just a thought.

I fail to see why either Rhode Island or Deleware need to be separate states. There are multiple counties in the US that are both bigger and more populous than both. Heck you can barely see them on a national map, let alone fit their abbreviation inside their borders on the map.

For example, the current governor is a registered Republican (and registered in the NPP), while the island’s representative in Congress chaired Obama’s campaign there, and is a registered Democrat (Despite also being a member of the NPP). There isn’t a direct Partisan comparison like say in Minnesota where the D-FL party is essentially the Democratic party of the state, as they are more or less single-issue parties on the basis of Puerto Rico’s status within the US.

As for their voting patterns, I’d say it would be likely to become the most Democratic state in the Entire country (Probably at least 75% Democratic), given that stateside Puerto Ricans vote overwhelmingly Democrat (Obama’s best district was the heavily Puerto Rican, South Bronx-based NY-16, where he scored 95% of the vote)

but that bill seems to be bad as written. A better option would be to keep the two-step process, but change the options. The first referendum would be on continued association with the US or full statehood (just the 2 options), the second (if continued association were to win) would be between statehood and remaining a commonwealth. That way neither statehood nor independence could win without the support of at least 50%+1 of the population, but in the end at least one of the four options will have achieved majority support.

Plurality voting has its place, but not in something this important.

1. Yes the raw demographics would equate to what would presumably be majority Democrat representation& stronghold in the future. But when Alaska and Hawaii came in, everyone was **sure** Hawaii would be a Republican lock and Alaska would be a Democrat lock, for the next several generations. Wow did things turn out differently!
2. Occasional statehood expansion is a good thing for America, just like a family blessed with a new child, it stresses logistics but makes everyone feel good somehow. Ike was a force behind AK and HI in 1959.
3. Coming in with a new sister is a very wise idea, it was used in 1959 and kept Congress from nitpicking the deal to death (see #1 above). But how could it be done this time? The Dems are thinking: DC! Only if they agree to move the seat of federal gov’t to Kansas. (no I’m not kidding)
4. I am not Hispanic, so allow this indulgent observation: Hispanics in America have been fantastically patriotic in serving in this country’s military over the last 100 years, and that includes PR. In South Texas alone there are at least 2 highways named after Medal of Honor winners (Roy Benavides and Freddy Gonzalez). When I think of the many who have served from PR, some making the ultimate sacrifice, it is hard to think that sooner or later PR would not come in as a state some day – if they want to. But see #5…
5. It’s true they have voted in multiple plebecites before and it always it deadlock &r gets hung up dead center. Why will this ever change that the pro-statehood party gets substantially over 50%?
6. But it would be nice if PR voted for statehood on their own, it would shut up Cuba and its idiotic propaganda machine in the Caribbean.
7. See Wikipedia, they already have a 51 star pattern figured out for the US flag if needed, and hey it doesn’t look that bad.
8. Annexing Cuba is not a joke. We had the opportunity 100 years ago (and Mexico 160 years ago), many serious policy thinkers believe, criticism from Europe be damned, we missed an opportunity that would have in the long run been good for everyone concerned, spared Cuba a half century of Castro and spared the world the frightful near-miss Cuban missile crisis. PR statehood might at least pave the way for a new era of American dealings and relations in the near Caribbean.
9. I trust the current Dem Congress to handle this about as well as they handled health care, which is, somewhere between banana republic and outright unconstitutionally.
10. Come to think of it, let’s only revisit this if the Republicans take control in Nov 2010 of one of the houses of Congress.
There you have it, the pro’s outnumber the con’s on this unscientific list, but among the con’s are some real deal killers.

Whenever bills have words in their title like “democracy”, “reform” or “security” alarms should go off in your head. There are two similar things the Democrats have tried to push for during this congress, when they have 60% in both chambers (roughly). One is the “Democracy Restoration Act” from Feingold and Conyers which would give felons votes. The other is the equally outrageous D.C. Voring Rights legislation which Orrin Hatch has always been terrible on. P.R. having a Republican governor means nothing. So does Vermont and Rhode Island. If you think they will be a Republican state in Presidential elections your mind is not working right. If it was really about giving everyone votes it is odd, because there are other territories which don’t vote either. I suspect, but can not confirm, that the majority of Puerto Ricans would not pay income taxes. This would only exacerbate a bad trend.

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=36605
see this article on representation without taxation

Generally I don’t see what we have to gain from making them a state.

Here is an interesting take
http://www.rollcall.com/issues/55_118/ma_congressional_relations/45328-1.html

It seems (although not sure) that it is not a very popular proposal in P.R.

but I have a hard time buying that Obama and a heavily democrat congress would consider something like this unless they thought it meant more dem votes – that is all “immigration reform” is about. Since when has this congress or Obama done anything otherwise?

Plus, PR is not subject to the same taxes that the 50 states are, correct? What is the benefit for PR citizens?

The fact that 1) the bill backers want PR to be a state, and 2) a majority is not needed for it to happen makes me very nervous about this.

All this is really pathetic because based on principle, I am for PR becoming a state. But instead its all a game to the people running the country.

They have been asking for it longer than PR. It’s not like i’d have to do a border crossing to get to eastern Washington. They would be self-sufficient.

As far as Puerto Rico, other than human capitol, I don’t know what htey bring to the union. Do they have any industry or commerce? Do they have schools and hospitals? What is there democratic tradition? Can they write a constitution? How much debt would they bring. They need to make the argument, not us. Why aren’t they taking a vote first and petitioning for statehood like the other states have?

it would provide a side door to illegal entry into the country. Puerto Ricans as many Hispanic folks, have stronger ties to their ethnicity than other nationalities. (For example—Luis Gitierrez. Next– I will bet my last dime that it will add almost all as Democrats.

So, more and better wealth distribution from us to them., a new major industry–false ID, etc to allow hundreds of thousands of illegals into America. And for God’s sake I didn’t think there were many expansionists left in America. I guess if you live in a cocoon, you can lie to yourself about the devastation around you.

Nothing like adding 4 million m ore to feed and vote for Obama.

I suppose that historically territories and separate sovereign entities have asked to become states before Congress admitted them,, but I wonder if this is required by the Constitution, laws passed by Congress, or is just merely a matter of custom.. As a practical matter it would cause a lot of civil unrest to force residents of a territory of the United States to unwillingly transition to statehood, but I don’t see where in the Constitution it says that their consent is required.

Additionally, some territories of the United States have been the spoils of war, so it’s not clear how much sense it would have made to give a conquered population the right of refusal.

It seems to me that whatever the end goals of those drafting this legislation, its current purpose is to manage the public perception of the process. I’d appreciate any commentary from constitutional scholars who could shed light on what is actually required for statehood. My reading of Article IV also doesn’t indicate to me whether or not the President has the power to veto the admission of a new state by Congress.

Yes, I know that there are expenses already with PR–my main concern is the voting bloc.

The fiscal side usually wins out.

We dont need anymore states. We dont need anymore governments. We dont need anymore senators or representatives.

This is another desperate ploy by the Demorats to bring in more minority voters. Nothing more.

I have a Puerto Rican sister-in-law, I truly love her she is a woman who has proudly served in our Army 3 years, and then worked for the last 20 + years in the Post Office. My nephews and niece are all 1/2 Puerto Rican and I think it would be really great to have the State of Puerto Rico. Having said that I also agree that there are questions to be answered, here at home and in Puerto Rico. I believe we need to make English (American style) as our official language. It is also necessary that we better protect our borders, and build the wall as it was supposed to be done. Put troops on the border between ourselves and both Canada and Mexico. Both borders are like swiss cheese and there are places where a tank could be driven through and on one would see it.
I don’t think we can in good conscience rid ourselves of any of our states, unless of course Texas could be allowed to secede so we don’t have to pay these idiotic health costs.
Just my $2 worth. (Used to be .02 cents inflation you know).

Just posted a response to this post.

Link: http://www.redstate.com/randyhaddock/2010/04/26/response-to-rep-doc-hastings-no-more-time-or-answers-are-needed-on-puerto-rico-status-bill-now-is-the-time-to-act-and-pass-hr-2499/

Congressman Hastings is misinformed about the current political situation in Puerto Rico. In the 2008 elections Puerto Ricans elected a fiscally conservative Republican governor, Luis Fortuño, by a whooping 225,000 vote margin and swept into power Republican majorities in the Insular Senate and House of Representatives and also gained control of 2/3 of the Island city halls.

Let’s wake up and learn the real statistics: if Puerto Rico becomes a state the Republican Party stands to gain two U.S. Senators and six members in the U.S. House or Representatives just like it actually happened in Alaska when it became a state that the pundits thought was going to go for the Democrats and wound up being a very red state.

Let history take its course and allow the U.S. Congress to fulfill the responsibility it accepted when it approved the Treaty of Paris in 1898 by sanctioning a referendum that will let the Puerto Rican people select a non territorial status ( statehood or independence with or without a pact of association with the U.S. ) and thus end the disgraceful condition of keeping 4 million loyal U.S. citizens disenfranchised.

Antonio Longo,
Southern Region Representative of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly

This is a trick to establish a gigantic voting bloc for the New Progressive party. Think of Minnesota, Chi town, etc, Philly, think of Al Franken’s ascent to the Senate. Are you kiddin’ me?All that we at Red State believe in and work for and support will be flooded out, washed away!

As one whose dark- skinned father was once discriminated against, I declare HR 2499 is not, not, NOT about racism. Nor is this “non-binding vote” about the nobility of American statehood.
This is a trigger for binding votes leading to the fundamental destruction of our moral republic!
¡Pare y piense por favor!