The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill during its lame-duck session Thursday in a last-ditch effort to allow Puerto Rico to “decolonize.”
The bill, which passed 233-191 with support from 16 Republicans and has very little chance of passing the Senate, would allow the U.S. territory to hold a first-ever binding referendum on whether to become a state or gain independence. It would ultimately offer the Puerto Rico voters three options: statehood, independence, or independence with free association.
The outgoing House Natural Resources Committee chairman who oversees the affairs of U.S. territories, Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-AZ), said, “It is crucial to me that any proposal in Congress to decolonize Puerto Rico be informed and led by Puerto Ricans.”
The Associated Press explained:
The proposal would commit Congress to accept Puerto Rico into the United States as the 51st state if voters on the island approved it. Voters also could choose outright independence or independence with free association, whose terms would be defined following negotiations over foreign affairs, U.S. citizenship and use of the U.S. dollar.
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The proposal of a binding referendum has exasperated many on an island that already has held seven nonbinding referendums on its political status, with no overwhelming majority emerging. The last referendum was held in November 2020, with 53% of votes for statehood and 47% against, with only a little more than half of registered voters participating.
The proposed binding referendum would be the first time that Puerto Rico’s current status as a U.S. commonwealth is not included as an option, a blow to the main opposition Popular Democratic Party, which upholds the status quo.
Additionally, having worked on this issue throughout his career in the House, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) said that getting the proposal on the House floor was “a long and torturous path” and that “for far too long, the people of Puerto Rico have been excluded from the full promise of American democracy and self-determination that our nation has always championed.”
Following the bill’s passage in the House, the bill will now go to the evenly split Senate, where it will face opposition from Republican lawmakers who have long opposed statehood and has a limited time to pass before the new Congress takes over in January.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Jacob Bliss is a reporter for Breitbart News. Write to him at jbliss@breitbart.com or follow him on Twitter @JacobMBliss.