Surprised at 18, but guess it's not that surprising.
Progressive Politics
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i thought this would be a reference to the Alice Cooper song. but yeah, I support statehood for Puerto Rico.
What is Puerto Rico, I'm not American.
Puerto Rico is an island east of the Dominican Republic, in the Caribbean. It is considered a U.S. territory.
In the U.S., territories are not equal to nor do they have the same privileges as U.S. states. Notably, they do not have anybody in Congress or the House of Representatives actually representing them.
Due to the electoral college, that also means Puerto Rico cannot contribute to the national U.S. elections in any significant way.
DC also has more people than 2 states. Basically if you take the top 52 subdivisions of the US by population, the only 2 that aren't states "just so happen" to be the two with the highest minority populations.
It seems like Puerto Ricans are pretty split on the issue
Where do you get that opinion? From my point of view being a state gives representation, how could this be worse than being unrepresented and ignored entirely?
They feel strongly about their perceived independence, and are often unhappy at the prospect of losing their seat at the Olympics, Miss Universe, etc.
It would be more democratic if Puerto Rico had the same congressional representation as a state. Same with DC. Also, maybe the number of senators for every state should be proportional to population, again to make things more democratic.