CNN
Puerto Rico’s energy grid took such a severe blow from deadly Hurricane Maria that restoring power to everyone may take months, Gov. Ricardo Rosselló told CNN on Wednesday night.
The entire system is down, the governor said. No one on the island has power from utilities.
“It depends on the damage to the infrastructure,” he said. “I’m afraid it’s probably going to be severe. If it is … we’re looking at months as opposed to weeks or days.”
The impact of the storm on the island territory won’t be realized until officials can do a flyover and see what remains.
Rosselló said officials think some power stations are not badly damaged, but the distribution system is ruined. If transmission lines are in better shape than thought, power outages might be fixed sooner, the governor said.
Hurricane Maria aftermath: Puerto Rico faces months without power
Repayment of last year’s bailout is, for all intents and purposes, off the table now that the entire island is pretty much destroyed. Uncle Sam can kiss that money goodbye.
We know that Puerto Rico has been run by socialists for many years thus insuring its people continued poverty. Short of declaring PR an independent state, which would immediately produce another Nicaragua and then a Cuban duplicate, what can be done?
The islanders are American citizens. Expect a huge influx to the mainland bringing their leftism with them. With a growing economy in the U.S., perhaps these new residents will make good and throw illegals out of the jobs they took from Americans…that’s just about the only good which can come from this new disaster.
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I don’t believe they have full US citizenship. They can’t vote in Presidential elections.
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I believe once they move here, if they want to stay, they have full rights of citizenship. When their residence is on the island, they can’t vote.
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Yeah, this is interesting and I’ve been wondering about that with the related support/assistance issues, etc. that come into focus with the hurricane damage.
I put the question in a search and wow – there are a hundred sites to suit any political taste. Here’s just one:
https://www.pri.org/stories/2016-11-01/millions-americans-cant-vote-president-because-where-they-live
Sort of gets at the thing (including other territories).
The fact that the infrastructure of Puerto Rico is such a dainty and delicate mess sure doesn’t speak well of them as Americans – of course, some of our urban areas are not much better. It’s a culturally confusing thing, I think.
They always make a big big deal of their “casting their vote” or “giving support” or something at the political parties’ conventions so it’s confusing…..I think it’s a lump or three under the nation’s rug.
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They can vote in the primaries, presumably because they are private party votes. I realized that when I was tracking primary votes last year.
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And they can vote if they establish residency in the mainland. I searched the subject and believe I read that there are about 900,000 living in FL.
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US Army Reserve general on Puerto Rico hurricane damage
Fox News
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