Estimated reading time: 9 minutes
“Quieren quitarme el río y también la playa,
Quieren el barrio mío y que abuelita se vaya,
No, no suelte’ la bandera ni olvide’ el leolai,
Que no quiero que hagan contigo lo que le pasó a Hawái.”They want to take the river from me and the bеach too,
Bad Bunny, “LO QUE LE PASÓ A HAWAii”
They want my neighborhood and they want grandma to leave,
No, don’t drop the flag or forget the leolai,
I don’t want them to do to you what happened to Hawaii.
Puerto Rico entered 2025 in the dark. The colony’s outdated power grid faced a massive blackout on New Year’s Eve, causing 90% of the island to lose electricity. Outages are a part of day-to-day life under the Yankee occupation that has impoverished and displaced Puerto Ricans since 1898. Colonialism attacks Puerto Rican unity. Young Boricuas — forced to leave in search of jobs — are exploited as cheap labor here in the states, all while millionaires move to Puerto Rico in droves. Outages, poverty, and migration are symptoms; colonialism is the illness. The independence movement, historically suppressed but rapidly growing, is the cure. A nation without self determination is a nation denied freedom, and Puerto Ricans have been enslaved for too long.
Why does Puerto Rico experience so many blackouts in the first place?
The “Commonwealth of Puerto Rico” has no sovereignty. Unlike the mainland, which pretends to be a democracy, Puerto Rico is controlled by Congress’ “plenary” powers. As a territory, they receive less federal funding than the states. Congress has never used its total control over Puerto Rico to meaningfully invest in the island’s economy. They have always treated Puerto Rico like an imperial colony, temporarily installing American companies and paying Puerto Rican workers lower wages than anywhere on the mainland.
The official excuse for why Puerto Rico cannot fix its power grid is that the island is in tremendous debt. This debt crisis can be traced back to a series of U.S. Congressional incursions on behalf of U.S. capital. Since the early 20th century, they have made Puerto Rico into a tax haven for U.S. investors and corporations. They transformed the agrarian economy into an industrial one, displacing hundreds of thousands of people in the process.
Operation Bootstrap, which began after World War 2, paints a brutal picture of colonialism on the island. Corporate taxes were eliminated to entice Yankee business. Meanwhile, wages were kept lower than anywhere on the mainland and unionism was suppressed. The colonial capitalists were making themselves a heaven on Earth, while the situation for Puerto Ricans only became more hellish. The farming economy was destroyed faster than advanced industry could be built, and the island became plagued by unemployment. Those who could find a job in the new factories enjoyed improved living standards, but there weren’t nearly enough for everyone. Almost 500,000 Puerto Ricans had to migrate to the U.S. in the 1950s in search of a wage. Whether they were kept on the island or sent to a foreign land, Operation Bootstrap was a corporate scheme to trap nationally oppressed Puerto Ricans into more advanced forms of wage slavery.
In a testament to the compromised insular government, their first governor Luis Muñoz Marín supported the federal government in blaming mass unemployment on Puerto Rican overpopulation. According to these traitors, Puerto Ricans had too many children, and needed to have less. By 1969, 35% of all child-bearing women had been sterilized. La Operación, they called it.
“The so-called insular government is only a corporation organized by the Congress of the United States.” Pedro Albizu Campos, President, National Party of Puerto Rico, 1950.
More recently in 2016, President Barack Obama completely took over Puerto Rico’s financial policy and placed it in the control of an unelected, seven member council of finance goons known as La Junta. Eight years later, they are still gutting Puerto Rico’s social safety net, cutting social programs, and leaving the power grid to rust. La Junta represents the interests of Congress, the White House, and USian business. There is not even the illusion of equality in the relationship between the U.S. and Puerto Rico; between an empire and its colony. It is one nation exploiting another at every turn.
Nearly 3,000 people died in the man-made catastrophe that followed Hurricane Maria in 2017. Only a few dozen perished in the storm itself. Thousands were killed over the following months as power was knocked out and clean water disappeared. The destroyed health care system was unable to prevent the spread of infectious disease, especially among the poor and the elderly. The people sacrificed on the altar of colonialism died in agony while imperial masters blocked relief from coming in.
As is often the case under capitalism, where the colonized and working classes face complete devastation, the owning class found fresh opportunities for new business. La Junta, on behalf of the U.S. capitalists, used Hurricane Maria to privatize the power grid. Without consulting the people, the Board created an energy contract for private companies Luma and Genera, companies based in the U.S. and its junior imperialist partner Canada. The move transfers money from Puerto Rico’s tax base off of the island directly into the hands of Yankee capitalists. Privatization was marketed as a way to stop blackouts and eventually modernize the power grid. Seven years later, all that has changed are the monthly bills, which are nearly 50% more expensive than in 2017.
According to Luma, the massive New Year’s blackout was caused by a single underground electric cable. The cable was so old and outdated that the company which manufactured it closed 28 years ago. A perfect microcosm of the overall power grid! Lights turned off around dawn on Tuesday, December 31 and stayed out all day and night, the only power available coming from diesel generators for the minority who could afford them. Most Puerto Ricans celebrated the New Year by candlelight. Power was eventually restored to 98% of customers by Wednesday afternoon, January 1, the blackout lasting a little over a day. Each blackout triggers more and more anger against Luma. The new Trump-supporting governor has already threatened to replace them. The company is performing so poorly that everyone, including the people who first supported privatization, are being forced to acknowledge its failure.
These corporate planners had Puerto Rico in an artificial economic bubble. Local Puerto Rican businesses had no way to compete with these tax incentives. The island’s economy would face destruction if the U.S. businesses left or if there was an economic downturn. This is what happened when the economy went into recession in 2006. Puerto Rico was in a debt snowball at this point; they were borrowing money just to pay the bills. Wall Street investors continued to push these loans even after it became obvious the government was going bankrupt. Puerto Ricans themselves were targeted by these predatory bonds. When the bond market finally crashed, hundreds of millions of dollars in Puerto Rican wealth disappeared overnight. The banks got away not just scot free, but rich. Puerto Ricans are footing the bill to this day. They are at the mercy of La Junta. Targeted by Wall Street hedge funds, they are paying off their government’s debt with the dilapidation of their power grid and hospitals. Mass displacement is the other half of this crime against the Puerto Rican people. As the island is gutted from the inside, the occupier lures Puerto Ricans with the chance of employment on the mainland. Between 2010 and 2020 alone, over 10% of Puerto Ricans have moved to the states. They survive on the farms, in the cities, but their heart stays in Puerto Rico.
The strength of the Puerto Rican nation lies in the unity of its people. In both the mainland and the colony, Puerto Ricans share the same oppressor. But Puerto Ricans will not defeat the Yankee Empire on their own. Full unity with the other oppressed nations — Black, Hawaiian, and other Native nations — is also required.
Puerto Rico will never be free in the subservient role of territory or state. Puerto Rico will only prosper, will only know freedom, as an economically and politically sovereign nation. Full support to a self-determined Puerto Rico, on both the mainland and the island! Unity with the nationally oppressed! Remember the Cry of Lares: ¡Libertad o muerte! ¡Viva Puerto Rico libre!
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