Full Equality for Puerto Rico

Floor Speech

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Mr. SOTO. Madam Speaker, I thank the Resident Commissioner.

Madam Speaker, here is my partner in equality in the Resident Commissioner Jenniffer Gonzalez-Colon. And she is not the only one. Florida is in the House tonight in support of you--Representative Demings, Representative Wasserman Schultz, Representative Salazar. We are all here to support our brothers and sisters back in my family's native island.

This is a little bit about history today, 105 years of citizenship. You know, I checked on ancestry.com, and the roots of my family back in Puerto Rico go back way further than they could ever tell--on the Soto side and on the Casanova side--with a few coming in the mid-1800s from the Canary Islands, but the rest back further than you can uncover through the internet.

When Teddy Roosevelt comes up on that San Juan Hill and you have the Spanish-American War, my relatives, my ancestors, were already there for an unknown and distant amount of time.

I also see Representative Wild. Representative Wild, thank you for being here as well from Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania is in the House.

When I think about the turn of the 20th century, my ancestors, some of whom I got to meet, like my great-grandmother, Altagracia Casanova, who still farmed by the time I was a little kid in Sabana Hoyos in Puerto Rico, they became citizens by statute. Then my great- grandparents, they had draft cards. They went and served in World War I. The first shots of World War I were fired off the coast of San Juan as the Germans attempted to enter the Caribbean.

From there, we saw my grandparents stationed in places in the Caribbean in South America during World War II. We know of the great, famed Borinqueneers serving in all of those wars together, as well as Korea.

This citizenship has been earned, encouraged, and in blood, in contributions in science and art and manufacturing and in so many other ways that have made this such a great United States of America.

But it is the recent history that I am most concerned about. After the 936 exemption ended, my family moved to central Florida from Puerto Rico. They were worried about the economic climate. They moved to central Florida for economic opportunity. My family up north, where I was raised, we soon followed and found ourselves in central Florida.

We don't want people to have to be forced to relocate because they are worried about economic prosperity. That is already in our family history as well.

Then you look at after that recession coming in, then PROMESA, austerity measures, that would never happen to a State. The types of cuts to government, the type of attack on sovereignty was terrible. We have many pensioners who served as civil servants in Puerto Rico who now live in central Florida, places like Representative Demings' and my districts and, I have no doubt, in south Florida and Wasserman Schultz' and Salazar's districts as well. So it affects us directly and indirectly.

Then we see, on top of that, Hurricane Maria. What devastation, the highest death toll of any natural disaster in modern American history. We see how important it is to have representation and how important it is to have fair treatment.

Then it has been the latest battles over these last couple of years. You and I have fought together, along with our allies here, on everything from food assistance to Medicaid to finally getting Puerto Rico treated equally in the American Rescue Plan, to finally getting the people of Puerto Rico treated equally in infrastructure.

But those battles will continue if we do not resolve the territorial status. That is why I was honored to co-introduce our bill, together with our friends, to admit Puerto Rico as a State, after a binding plebiscite, of course.

I feel very good about where we are headed, to a bipartisan vote on the floor and putting forward a bill that the Senators can vote for.

This is about making sure, as we see tyranny attacks of democracy versus autocracy in Ukraine and, frankly, in so many places around the Caribbean, Central and South America, this is where we can take a stand in the Caribbean for democracy and give our brothers and sisters back on the island the opportunity to forge your own destinies, and your Florida Rican brothers and sisters are with you.

Miss GONZALEZ-COLON. Madam Speaker, I say thank you to our main sponsor. I will say, I don't have the vote here in the House so I depend on all Members of the House to support Puerto Rico in many ways.

In that sense, I will be always grateful, Darren, for your commitment and your help.

Madam Speaker, I recognize now a dear friend from Florida as well who is here.

Before recognizing her, I recognize a former Member of the House and current Governor of Puerto Rico. Pedro Pierluisi is here on the floor of the House. Thank you, Governor, for supporting this.

Madam Speaker, this is a bipartisan issue. You won't find any other bill that will have bipartisan support. This is not a Republican issue. This is not a Democratic issue. This is the cost of equal rights. This is civil rights. This is democracy.

Madam Speaker, I cannot find a better person to speak about that than my good friend from Miami, Congresswoman Salazar.

Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Salazar).

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