Author | Lightnews

Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 1m

It is said the Cuomintang government has fled to Staten Island.

Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 41m

Como quiera, si se calculan los resultados de los plebiscitos sobre total de papeletas estatales - que en ausencia del dato de votaron según lista se usa desde 2016 como sustituto de dicha cifra - la estadidad se quedó en 48.3% de todos los votantes, frente a 50.6% en 2020. /FIN

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 41m

Es decir, puede haber habido casos de electores que votaron la papeleta del plebiscito pero no la estatal, y de hecho en 392 colegios regulares hubo más papeletas del plebiscito que estatales. Pero en otros colegios hubo igual (1,398) o mayor cantidad (2,700) de las estatales. 5/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 41m

En las unidades regulares la brecha se abrió a cuenta de electores que no depositaron la papeleta del plebiscito, aunque sí depositaron la papeleta estatal, en una aparente señal de protesta. Dicho eso, se trata de una diferencia neta. 4/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 41m

En el caso de las unidades regulares de 2024, la brecha fue más marcada donde el PNP - y por ende la estadidad - estaban más débiles, y mucho menos pronunciada donde estaban más fuertes: 3/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 41m

En particular, llama la atención el crecimiento exponencial de la brecha en las unidades regulares de voto presencial el día del evento: 2/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 41m

Y hablando de la estadidad y del plebiscito de 2024, un detalle que había observado de pasada, más sin estudiarlo hasta ahora ha sido el surgimiento y ampliación de una brecha entre los que votan en la papeleta estatal y la papeleta de los plebiscitos concurrentes: 1/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 2h

Also, Ben Nighthorse Campbell of Colorado.

Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 2h

Because they might not be Democrats for long, and switch to GOP the moment they think it will suit them politically. Richard Shelby of Alabama comes to mind.

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 2h

I should also note that blank/invalid voting in Puerto Rico is usually negligible (and thus makes little difference); 99.2% cast valid votes in the 2024 gubernatorial election, while the remaining 0.8% included write-in votes, undervotes and overvotes in addition to wholly blank and invalid ballots.

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 2h

At the regular polling station level, the correlation between the share of blank ballots in the plebiscite and the PPD share of the vote for governor was a moderately high 0.68. However, not all PPD voters cast blank ballots; as in 2012, many voted for free association for one reason or another.

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 2h

For reference, these were the results of the 2024 gubernatorial election in the election day regular polling stations by PPD % share (and yes, they were an unmitigated disaster for the party, which had its worst-ever election result and for the first time in its history finished in third place):

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 2h

First, blank votes in the P.R. 2024 status plebiscite show a strong relationship with the results polled in regular i.e. election day polling stations ("unidades regulares") by PPD, with many of their voters protesting the exclusion of the Commonwealth (status quo) option backed by the party:

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 2d

A flag change was discussed under B.J. Vorster - Verwoerd's successor - but nothing came out of it. As for Musk, his father was involved for a while with the liberal, anti-apartheid and largely English-speaking PFP, even standing as their 1981 election nominee in Pretoria's Sunnyside constituency.

Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 2d

The racist nostalgia around the flag of S.A. under white minority rule and apartheid is a bit ironic when one considers that back in the day die-hard Afrikaner supremacists hated it on account of featuring in the "bowtie" the Union Jack - the very embodiment of the despised "liberalist" values.

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

Juan Manuel García Pasalacqua QEPD

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

Finally, I should note that support for statehood in P.R., while significant, has remained around half of *all* votes cast: factoring in blank or invalid ballots cast in protest against successive non-binding plebiscites, statehood slipped from 50.8% in 2020 to 49.1% in 2024. /END

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

At any rate, I can't help but scoff at the notion held by many liberals in the U.S. that P.R. as a state would boost Democrats in the U.S. Congress; the island might elect Democratic senators and congressmen, but if so they could end up well to the right of John Fetterman and Jared Golden. 9/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

In fact, decades ago some PNP leaders were so brazen in their attempts to align with the party holding the White House that they kept switching their U.S. party identification from one party to another, leading a local political analyst to label them as "burrofantes" - literally "donkeyphants." 8/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

That said, there have been exceptions to that trend: for example, when Luis Fortuño was governor in 2009-12, he remained staunchly pro-GOP and critical of then-president Barack Obama. The result was that the latter snubbed him during an official visit to P.R. 7/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

Moreover, over the years PNP has been in power it has often sought to identify closely with the party holding the White House. As such,when Biden was president in 2021-24 PNP depicted itself as a liberal/centrist party; nowadays they present themselves as conservatives closely aligned with DJT. 6/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

Now, stateside readers might wonder if pro-GOP statehood backers in P.R. don't realize that Republicans in the U.S. are overwhelmingly against statehood, and the answer is that they're in denial, largely blindsided by the GOP's lurch to the far right. 5/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

Specifically, although Puerto Rico's ruling, pro-statehood New Progressive Party (PNP) is generally quite conservative, it houses both self-identified Democrats and Republicans, and its voters will back party candidates irrespective of U.S. party identification. 4/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

This comes across as counter-intuitive to folks in the U.S., where GOP is largely against statehood for P.R. while Democrats often support it. But Puerto Rico has a different party system, and U.S. party identification has traditionally played a distinctly minor role in elections there. 3/

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Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

One detail about Puerto Rican politics often poorly understood by liberals in the U.S. is that pro-statehood sentiment in the island is far stronger among conservatives who backed DJT in the 2024 "symbolic" presidential vote than among those who supported Kamala Harris: 1/

bsky.app/profile/malv...

Manuel Alvarez-Rivera @malvarezrivera.bsky.social · 5d

A continuación se presentan las distribuciones porcentuales actualizadas del ejercicio de inferencia ecológica entre el voto presidencial "simbólico" en 4,490 colegios regulares de voto presencial del pasado 5 de noviembre según el voto en el plebiscito, conforme a los datos del escrutinio: 1/

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