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President Donald Trump said Sunday that he would not support Puerto Rico's efforts to secure a state if San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz continued to serve in the United States.
Speaking on Geraldo Rivera's radio show, Trump called Yulín Cruz "extremely incompetent" and a "horror show" that could hinder the creation of a state.
"I'll tell you this, with the mayor of San Juan as bad as she is and as incompetent as she is, Puerto Rico should not talk about the state before having any people who really know what they do, "Trump said. said Rivera.
"When you have good leadership, it certainly can be something they talk about," continued the president. "But with people like Puerto Rico, I would be an absolute no."
Yulín Cruz, a vocal critic of Trump, responded to the president on Monday, tweeting that he had attacked her for "telling the truth." She also argued that most Puerto Ricans are not in favor of
More than 3 million US citizens live in Puerto Rico, although they do not enjoy many constitutional rights, such as voting in presidential elections, because of the territorial status of the island.
The Congress is the only body authorized to grant statehood, but many presidents, including Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, supported the state of Puerto Rico if that was the wish of most island.
The pro-state political party of Puerto Rico took control of the local legislature, the governor's mansion and the seat of the Congress without the right to vote in 2016. In a referendum in June 2017, Puerto Ricans voted in The 51st One-quarter of registered voters went to the polls, in part because of a boycott by the major parties opposed to the state.
In any case, efforts to obtain statehood have stopped in recent months.
Earlier this month, Puerto Rican Governor Ricardo Rosselló reiterated his call for statehood while addressing the aftermath of last year's hurricanes.
"We are second-class American citizens," Rosselló told CBS News. "We live in a colonial territory. It is time to eliminate that. I urge all elected representatives, especially the mid-term elections, to have a firm position: you are either for the colonial territories or against. You are either to give equal rights to US citizens living in Puerto Rico, or you are opposed to it. "
Since hurricanes Irma and Maria ravaged Puerto Rico last September, Trump and Yulin Cruz have repeatedly traded beards in the media about the federal government's response. While Trump downplayed the severity of the devastation in the days following Maria's arrival, Yulín Cruz frequently asked the president to send extra help.
"We are dying and you kill us with inefficiency and bureaucracy," said the mayor at a press conference last September, a few days before Trump's arrival at Porto Rico. "I hope the president will come next week, he does not just have an aerial view of the situation. Let him hear the cries of the elderly outside the windows and doors, shouting "Help us".
Last month, Mr. Rosselló increased the official number of victims of Hurricane Maria from 64 to 2975 after the publication of a study on storm-related deaths commissioned by the Puerto Rican government.
Still, Trump insisted that the federal government's response to Hurricane Maria was "underestimated" and was an "unsung success story".
On Sunday, he questioned the credibility of the study, as he has done several times since his release, claiming that some Puerto Rican officials simply wanted to "blame him."
"The truth is that you have incompetent leadership and that the mayor of San Juan is an extremely incompetent person," he said. "I love the people of Puerto Rico. And I did a good job. I had things in Puerto Rico that no one could have got. … And instead of thanking you, we only had bad publicity. "
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