House clears Puerto Rico referendum
Voters can choose to become US state
The US House of Representatives on Thursday approved a bill allowing Puerto Rico to hold a binding referendum next year on whether to become a US state or an independent country.
The bill offers three options to voters for the plebiscite, which would be held next November: make Puerto Rico the 51st US state, become independent or be a sovereign territory freely associated with the United States.
Despite its approval in the House by 233 votes in favour to 191 against, it is unlikely that the bill will pass the Senate.
And next month the Republican Party, which mostly opposed the referendum, will retake control of the lower chamber and will have the chance to block the proposal.
“This is the first time that the House of Representatives has approved a bill that seeks to permanently resolve the territorial status of Puerto Rico and obliges Congress to implement the will of the people,” said Puerto Rican Governor Pedro Pierluisi said on Twitter.
Mr Pierluisi, who travelled to Washington for the occasion, said the bill “is one more step towards the end of colonialism on the island, and to respond to the demand for equality of my people”.
Puerto Rico has been a US territory since 1898 and is considered a Commonwealth, with its own constitution and autonomy in several sectors, but it relies on the United States in matters such as defense, immigration and customs.
The 3.3 million Puerto Ricans are US citizens but cannot vote in the presidential elections, and neither can their representatives vote in the US Congress.
It is the fourth time that the lower house has approved a bill to call a plebiscite, although previous referendums were non-binding. Each one failed to pass the Senate.
The island’s political status has been a matter of debate for decades.
Mr Pierluisi’s New Progressive Party (PNP) advocates becoming a US state.
The opposition Popular Democratic Party for its part defends maintaining the current status quo. Its president, Jose Luis Dalmau, was very critical of the project approved on Thursday.
“The project approved at the end of the Democrats’ mandate in the federal chamber has no chance of becoming law,” he said in a statement posted on Twitter.
“Once again the leadership of the PNP has preferred its ideological aspirations to the true needs of Puerto Rican men and women,” he said.