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[Karlito]

Informative, thank you for the link, I was looking for something like that earlier in the day.

Yeah, the article is only a few hours old -- the press is only just starting to cover the story. Hopefully in the next few days we can get statements from Congress on the issue.

[Eagleon]

There's no say from the governor, if I'm not mistaken, and they could hardly consider that 100% the will of the people since he's in charge of more than just the stance on whether to become a state. Those numbers are troubling for another reason, though. I don't know the voting population, but that's like 12% of the population, total, unless my math is way off. Whereas turnout for presidency is closer to 60% of voting population. You'd think more people would show up to have their say in something like this.

[Meansdarling]

When I was asking how soon could PR become a state,

I was really asking "How many days/months/years would the process take?"

How long does it take to pass a bill/law/thing like statehood?

[misko27]

Well.

Congress could draw it up today if they wanted. They aren't. it's going to take as long as any other bill, probably longer, given the constrictions when congress resumes on the third of January.

So stupendously long, probably a few months at best. Assuming it occurs.

[Meansdarling]

So could happen within the year.  That'd be cool.

What sort of normalization would occur afterward?

I imagine there would be some immigration from PR to other states.

[Pnx]

IIRC Puerto Ricans are already US citizens, and there's been nothing stopping them from moving somewhere else in the country, so I don't see why immigration would pick up.

Personally in my highly inexpert opinion, I expect it to get done somewhere in about 2-4 years, probably before the next election, but with some kind of dumb strings attached. Congress can be really inane about this stuff.

[Euld]

I second the notion that it will probably take a minimum of two years.  This isn't something I'd expect Congress to finish with anything resembling speed, especially if it might bring some sort of disadvantage to one of the political parties.

Heck, wouldn't be surprised if the Republicans opposed practically everything resembling progress during the next four years.

[mainiac]

Heck, wouldn't be surprised if the Republicans opposed practically everything resembling progress during the next four years.

All the while insisting they support statehood.  Wouldn't be surprised if they say the constitution needs to contain poison pill sections on abortion/gays/guns just to slow things down.

[GlyphGryph]

That's troubling, but leaving a ballot blank isn't really valid or indicative of anything in particular. If those voters wanted to stay where they were, then why not just vote that?

They did - they lost.

Yeah, we might be jumping the gun considering the ballot question was not conclusive and the pro-statehood governor is no longer in office.

The ballot was inconclusive the same way Obama's original election to president was inconclusive - after all, he only had the sort of 21% of the population. That's significantly less support than Puerto Rico statehood got.

IIRC Puerto Ricans are already US citizens, and there's been nothing stopping them from moving somewhere else in the country, so I don't see why immigration would pick up.

Immigration TO Puerto Rico would probably pick up - a bit part of it's current problems are due to it's nature resulting in about half of the people born there living somewhere other than Puerto Rico.

[Bohandas]

to keep it at 50 let's just cede new mexico to old mexico, it is already lost anyways

And Texas, we should give them back Texas.

[Owlbread]

Let the Republic of Lakotah go independent, that will solve a lot of problems (and possibly create several).

[ISP]

Its not becoming a state, everyone is too used to the 50 states as they are, to allow change.

[Oliolli]

*walks in*

*US political talk*

*goes back to hoping and waiting for the United States of Europe to be formed*

Heck, wouldn't be surprised if the Republicans opposed practically everything resembling progress during the next four years.

And then blame Obama for the lack of progress.

[RedKing]

Its not becoming a state, everyone is too used to the 50 states as they are, to allow change.

By that logic, there's no way Hawaii and Alaska would have been added, since it'd been nearly 50 years since the previous state was added, and they were both far further from "the lower 48" than Puerto Rico is.

For that matter, you could say, "The President will always be an old white dude, because everyone is used to that."

[Owlbread]

*walks in*

*US political talk*

*goes back to hoping and waiting for the United States of Europe to be formed*

Heck, wouldn't be surprised if the Republicans opposed practically everything resembling progress during the next four years.

And then blame Obama for the lack of progress.

Good sir, I am very interested to hear why you would want a united states of europe.