Puerto Rico has been hit with one of the year's strongest hurricanes but despite this we haven't heard nearly enough about it as we did when hurricanes Harvey and Irma made landfall in Texas and Florida respectively. But why should American media pay attention to Puerto Rico's problems. Don't we have enough problems here in the States? I mean, it's not like Puerto Ricans are American citizens, right? Well, actually they are, and they have been for the last 100 years.
But for some reason that completely baffles baffles me, most people don't know that people born in Puerto Rico are naturally born American citizens, eligible for the same social services and rights as if they had been born in any of the 50 states you know and love. Except for the fact that Puerto Rico is not really a state at all. Which begs the question, why are Puerto Ricans American citizens? Well, the short answer is war. You see, like much of Latin America and the Caribbean, the island of Puerto Rico was a Spanish colony for over 400 years.
A relationship which abruptly ended when America decided it wanted military bases in the Caribbean and the Pacific. and kicked the Spanish out of Puerto Rico, Cuba, Guam, and the Philippines in 1898. Well, it's called the Spanish-American War, but we don't have time to get into all of that right now, so Google it. Fast forward to 1917, when Congress voted to grant citizens citizenship to every person born in the island. However, voting not to recognize the island as a proper state of America, but rather as an unincorporated territory.
Which, as Puerto Ricans would soon find out, meant that while they are expected to pay the same taxes and obey the same laws as their fellow countrymen on the mainland, They don't get to vote in presidential elections, don't get real representation in Congress, and unlike Detroit, their local government can't file for bankruptcy in times of economic turmoil. Which really sucks right now because the island owes over $123 billion to its creditors, a debt that the local government has no way of realistically paying and has responded by cutting as many services as it can to its people. That's 3.4 million fellow American citizens struggling on an island where the current unemployment rate is at 12%, half of its residents are on Medicaid, and a staggering 46% live below the poverty line. Naturally, this has caused an exodus of the island's workforce. The Pew Research Center reports that more than 400,000 Puerto Ricans have migrated towards the mainland to look for the jobs and stability that simply can't be found in their native island.
And if all that weren't bad enough, on September 20th, 2017, the island was hit by one of the strongest storms to ever hit the US, Hurricane Maria. A hurricane that, despite destroying the island's power grid and forcing tens of thousands to evacuate their towns, has not gotten anywhere near the media attention that Hurricanes Irma or Harvey got. Media attention that inspired thousands of people to aid the cities and towns affected by these storms.
Good luck, everybody. Which is an appropriate response on behalf of American citizens when they saw their fellow countrymen in trouble. A response that unfortunately hasn't been replicated towards helping the American citizens living in Puerto Rico.
Which kind of makes me want to reframe the whole point of this video. The question shouldn't be, why aren't Puerto Ricans American citizens? But rather, why aren't American citizens taking better care of Puerto Rico?