Puerto Rico’s Debt Crisis Findings from NiLP’s July 2015 Opinion Leaders Survey (July 22, 2016)

by Angelo Falcón (July 22, 2016)

The massive debt crisis facing Puerto Rico has resulted in efforts to mobilize the more than 5 million stateside Puerto Ricans to address this problem facing the 3.5 million residents of the Island. Some new groupings have begun to emerge in response such as the National Puerto Rican Agenda and the VAMOS4PR Network. On Sunday, July 24th, the National Puerto Rican Agenda will be holding their founding summit in Camden, New Jersey, just across the river from Philadelphia where the Democratic National Convention will be taking place that week. On Monday, July 25th, a United for Puerto Rico rally will be held in the afternoon in Philadelphia.

One issue that has taken center stage has been the recent passage by the US Congress of the PROMESA Act to address Puerto Rico’s fiscal crisis. While this legislation provided Puerto Rico with the bankruptcy protection tools it needed to restructure its debt, the law borough with it a number of controversial elements introduced by Republicans, such as the introduction of a fiscal control board and the lowering of the minimum wage to $4.25 for younger workers. This has generated much opposition to this measure in Puerto Rico and the diaspora.

This online survey was conducted by the National Institute for Latino Policy (NiLP) during July 12-18, 2016. A total of 304 Latino opinion leaders participated from throughout the United States, While this may be the closest thing to a survey of national Latino leadership in existence today, it is not based on a scientific sample, making our findings only suggestive of broader tends and attitudes. The intent of this survey is to stimulate discussion and debate on critical issues facing the Latino community by providing some insights into the thinking of a broad range of engaged Latino leaders.

To get a sense of the level of support or opposition, there is to the PROMESA Act in the stateside Puerto Rican community. We asked the Latino opinion leaders whether they support or oppose this legislation. We found that among the Puerto Rican opinion leaders a large majority were opposed (67 percent). This is in contrast to the Mexican and other Latino opinion leaders, who were more supportive. As expected, significant percentages of the Mexicans (33 percent) and other Latinos (24 percent) shared they weren’t sure, compared to only 3 percent of the Puerto Ricans. This could be an indication that the issue is not as well known outside of the Puerto Rican community.

Would the Puerto Rico debt issue have any impact on the US Presidential election? While the issue hasn’t, at this point, became a major issue of debate by the presidential candidates, when we asked the Latino opinion leaders about issues that they found troubling about the Clinton candidacy, her support of the PROMESA Act did not register as being the most important for the Puerto Rican opinion leaders. The issue the Puerto Ricans found most troubling about her was the Benghazi incident (35 percent), while for the Mexicans its is her mishandling fo the State Department emails (50 percent) and for the other Latinos, her SU oo IRT of the $12 instead of the $15 minimum wage (20 percent).

Table 2 – Which of the following do you find most troubling about Hillary Clinton’s candidacy for President?
		Ethnicity
		Mexican	Puerto Rican	Other Latino
	The Benghazi incident	0.0%	34.8%	14.0%
	Her mishandling of State Department emails and classified information	50.0%	17.6%	18.0%
	Her support of the PROMESA  Act on Puerto Rico’s debt crisis	18.3%	18.7%	18.0%
	Her support of a $12 an hour instead of a $15 an hour minimum wage	5.0%	13.9%	20.0%
	Her failure to release the transcript to the speech Goldman Sachs paid for	13.3%	5.9%	16.0%
	None of the above	8.3%	5.9%	8.0%
	Not sure	5.0%	3.2%	6.0%
Total		100.0%	100.0%	100.0%

As the stateside Puerto Rican community mobilizes itself in defense of Puerto Rico, it has created some new grouping as well as activating existing organizations on this issue. At this point, it is the impression of many within the Puerto Rican community that this organizing has been ad hoc and at times hard to follow. To get a sense of the Latino opinion leaders’ perceptions of these efforts we asked them which of these current efforts they thought was being the most effective.

We found that Latino opinion leaders were very divided on this question and there was no consensus on the effectiveness of these efforts. This clearly reflects the relatively early stage of the organization of these campaigns. Among the Puerto Rican opinion leaders, the group seen as being most effective is the A Call to Action on Puerto Rico Collective (by 14 percent), which focuses on a pro-independence agenda for Puerto Rico. This was closely followed by the CUNY Center for Puerto Rican Studies (by 13 percent), which had hosted a very successful Puerto Rican diaspora summit qat Hunter College. The National Puerto Rican Agenda, which is holding its summit on Sunday, came in next, along with its organizing committee, the Caucus of Puerto Rican Elected Officials.

Which of the following organizations do you feel provides the most effective response in the stateside Puerto Rican diaspora for assisting Puerto Rico to resolve its current fiscal crisis?
		Ethnicity
		Mexican	Puerto Rican	Other Latino
	A Call to Action on Puerto Rico Collective	0.0%	14.1%	8.3%
	Caucus of Puerto Rican Elected Officials	8.9%	7.6%	6.3%
	Center for Puerto Rican Studies (CUNY)/Centro de Estudios Puertorriqueños	12.5%	13.0%	8.3%
	National Puerto Rican Agenda (NPRA)	10.7%	8.2%	2.1%
	National Puerto Rican Coalition	3.6%	6.0%	2.1%
	The Hedgeclippers	0.0%	1.1%	4.2%
	The Hispanic Federation	5.4%	1.1%	6.3%
	The VAMOS4PR Network	0.0%	6.5%	2.1%
	Center for a New Economy	0.0%	4.9%	0.0%
	Others	17.9%	14.7%	14.6%
	None of the Above	12.5%	19.0%	29.2%
	Never heard of any of these groups	28.6%	3.8%	16.7%
Total		100.0%	100.0%	100.0%

Based on the results of this survey and other information, we have developed this preliminary mapping of these diasporic mobilizing efforts:

As this mapping illustrated, there is a broad range of activities being generated, from different political frames and approaches. The National Puerto Rican Agenda Summit this Sunday will attempt to bring these efforts together in an agenda that will address Puerto Rico’s debt crisis and issues related to the well-being of the stateside Puerto Rican community as well. There are currently serious disagreements over support of the PROMESA Bill, the priority that should be given to the political status question, the role of nationalist versus class issues, etc.Sunday’s National Puerto Rican Agenda Summit will hopefully result in a useful strategy to address the need for unity in these deeply troubled times for the Puerto Rican people.

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