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Comment by wavefunction | Hacker News Reader

I think it's high time for Puerto Rico to become a US state. Puerto Rico has twice the population of the two Dakotas combined and the only way they'll receive more-equitable treatment is if they become a state. I think the will is there locally but there has been resistance from established political factions in the US who fear a place that might tip the balance of power one way or the other.

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I agree with you, and I'll go a step further. The US should not have any colonial territories or federal districts where US citizens live who have second-class rights compared to citizens of the 50 states.

That means DC, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and American Samoa (collectively 3.8 million US citizens) should all be made states.

There are undoubtedly lots of issues and hiccups with implementing that, but fundamentally I think that having classes of citizens with abridged rights is wrong.

I'll go even further: find a way to grant them all the rights of citizenship (representation for their taxation) and let them decide for themselves on statehood. If there's any downside (I honestly don't know, maybe there is?), those people should be given the choice to determine their course of action for themselves.

But I agree completely, having people who pay taxes and can't access all the machinery of government they fund is criminal. (This also includes disenfranchised felons, but especially disenfranchised ex-felons.)

I think we're maxed out on this thread for who to enfranchise, which is good!

I believe one of the big downsides for citizens of Puerto Rico that has caused issues with the push for statehood is that they don't currently pay federal income tax. So it isn't exactly a taxation-without-representation situation, but they are obviously at the mercy of the US in many ways and don't have access to all of the levers of power that are available to others.

Witness the suffering at our delay in suspending the Jones Act (requiring two days of debate) during the Hurricane Maria relief campaign.

I doubt that Puerto Rico's lot would fundamentally change if they were a separate country though, they would still be largely at the mercy of their main trading partner and dominant regional power (the US).

I was also thinking of felons in my earlier comment, but it didn't quite fit my narrative. I don't find the rationale that they would just vote for there to be no laws particularly compelling.

PR residents are actively against the idea mainly because they don't pay fed taxes. only reason democrats are for the idea is because they believe it'll give them another two reliable seats in the senate.

PR residents voted in favor of statehood in a referendum[0] in the most recent election cycle. 52.34% voted in favor, based on a turnout of 52%.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_Puerto_Rican_status_refer...

well that's new.... I was there back in 2017 and everyone I spoke to was very against it, and I remember when I looked up the stats they also showed the majority weren't for it. Still looks like it's a close issue, statehood is a big deal and affects everyone dramatically, kinda feel like it should have overwhelming support, not 51% of 52% of ppl... that's actually only 26% of eligible voters voting for it.

Would you believe, almost exactly the same proportion of the U.S. electorate that voted for Donald Trump in 2016?

What? He got 46%.

What’s the relevance of that stat?

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/10/4/16385658/p....

> Puerto Rico is a US territory and not a state, so its residents don’t pay federal income tax unless they work for the US government. Even so, workers there pay the majority of federal taxes that Americans on the mainland pay — payroll taxes, social security taxes, business taxes, gift taxes, estate taxes and so on.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Puerto_Rico_locations_....

> In 2017, Puerto Rico had a median household income of $19,775 — the lowest of any state or territory in the United States.

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> PR residents are actively against the idea mainly because they don't pay fed taxes.

They do. They don't pay income tax which with their low incomes is marginal anyway.

Your argument basically boils down to: well they do pay some tax so they can pay more anyways... not a great argument.

They recently voted for statehood in a plebescite. I believe the official GOP platform does actually support statehood, but I'm of the view that GOP politicians and voters don't actually know what their platform is beyond revanchism

Obviously, they will official support it for cosmetic purposes of promoting “democracy”. In practice, however, they know it will cause them to lose power, so they won’t vote for it.

Same reason Washington DC residents don’t have representation in the Senate. Or why the popular vote does not matter for the president.

Washington DC isn't a state because it was literally created to not be a state.

If they want to give DC residents voting rights they should make it impossible to be a DC resident and instead anyone who lives within DC should vote as part of the state the land was taken from for federal elections.

That solves everyone's problems (well aside from the democrats who are trying to get another 2 seats in the senate).

Local issues should still be decided at the federal level because that's the whole reason it exists, so a state can't take the seat of fed gov hostage as happened in 1783 in philly.

If you don't want DC to be controlled by the fed then it should be swallowed by maryland or virginia. Making a single city a state unto itself doesn't make any sense unless you're specifically trying to make political hay.

DC has nearly the same amount of people as North Dakota.

Having two Dakotas doesn't make any sense from a political representation point of view either, but here we are.

two wrongs don't make a right.

That this is clearly a partisan issue for you in your own words instead of an issue of Americans receiving their due representation is disappointing.

The fact that you feel so smugly confidant in your hyper-condescending self-righteousness is similarly disappointing. Especially because I gave two real solutions that make a lot more sense and you dismissed them out of hand because they're "partisan", when they're absolutely the opposite. both my solutions make a lot more sense from an objective standpoint, because they preserve the due representation and one of them also preserves the original intent in making DC independent.

It's kinda mindblowing that you can't identify your own hypocrisy right off the bat and actually posted this comment.

State creation has been partisan for much of this country's history for what it's worth. I find any excuse for not giving the district two senators and a representative (or more) to be unconscionable and based in partisan politics. You are welcome to argue otherwise.

Wait, so in your first comment you’re upset that I’m being partisan, and then here you’re saying it has to be partisan?

That’s quite the turn around.

You’ve also made some pretty bold claims without explanation. What makes you feel that it’s “unconscionable and based in partisan politics” to not give a single city two senators and instead follow the two options I proposed?

ETA: Your hypocrisy is brought into even starker relief with this comment. You’re like the people who were arguing for packing the courts (before the election) because it just makes sense (for whatever inane “nonpartisan” reason they could come up with), and then when asked “What if Trump wins?”, their face just drops...

One can ensure people have their due representation without making DC state. e.g., giving DC special senators and representatives in House (with regular voting powers) without making DC state (and thus keeping US congress exclusive jurisdiction over DC).

Your proposed solution creates its own host of problems. Someone can't vote in a state unless they are residents of that state, subject to the laws and jurisdiction of that state. For example - what does it mean for DC residents to vote in, say, Virginia, for a Federal election. Who defines the Congressional districts? Do you pre-dictate to Virginia that it gets a Congressional district that matches the boundary of DC? What if that district has radically more or fewer residents than other districts in the state?

I'm seriously considering your proposal and not mocking it, but I don't think it's any more or less sensible, on its face, than creating a new "state". Note, I put "state" in quotes because I don't see why we can't dictate in that state constitution that the state is administered by Congress.

Evidence leads me to believe PR would be competitive. GOP primary voters are overwhelmingly racist though, so the politicians feel an imaginary sword hanging over their heads.

You don’t have to think anything, there are millions of boricuas across the US who will happily fill you in on how divisive statehood is and how little mainland politics factor into it.

Thanks but they had to establish their boricuas outside of PR to have any input which makes me discount their input against the idea.

They're better off becoming independent. There's nothing for them in the United States. The statehood cry is only coming from cynical democrats and corrupt business politicians in PR whose only interest is in trade with the US for their own benefit because they have financial connections to the US, not ordinary Puerto Ricans. The only reason statehood gets so high in these polls is that the commonwealth, free association and independence voters have been boycotting the plebiscites forever.

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