Editing Politics of Puerto Rico (section)

=== Presidential politics in Puerto Rico ===
Although the [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican Party]] and [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democratic Party]] chapters in Puerto Rico have selected voting delegates to the national nominating conventions since the early 1900s, public interest in these processes heightened as a result of the efforts of a group of Democratic statehooders led by [[Franklin Delano López]] in 1976 to elect delegates supporting former Georgia Gov. [[Jimmy Carter]] to that year's [[Democratic National Convention]]. On October 23, 1979, the first primary of a party affiliated to the Democratic National Committee was held in Puerto Rico. Franklin Delano López was elected Chairman of the New Democratic Party of Puerto Rico by the direct votes of 374,000 American citizens residing on the Island. Lopez then moved the Puerto Rican Legislature to adopt a Presidential Primary Law. During the discussion of the Presidential primary Law, Lopez managed to persuade Presidential Chief of Staff, [[Hamilton Jordan]] and [[Timothy Kraft]] to grant Puerto Rico the right for a more robust delegation, the inclusion of Puerto Rico after [[Pennsylvania]] in the roll call of the state in exchange of eliminating from the bill that Puerto Rico was going to be the first Presidential Primary in the Nation. As a result of that effort, the Puerto Rico Legislature approved a law regulating presidential primaries in 1979, the first of which was held in 1980, with [[George H. W. Bush]] winning the [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]] primary and President [[Jimmy Carter|Carter]] beating Senator [[Ted Kennedy|Edward "Ted" Kennedy]] in a hard-fought Democratic primary. More than 1.2 million American citizens residing in Puerto Rico participated in the primaries.

In the first internal primary of a National political party, the new slate of statehooders, headed by Franklin Delano López took control of the local Democratic party chapter. In January 1980 after clashing with Governor [[Carlos Romero Barceló]], Lopez was forced to resign the chairmanship of the New Democratic Party in exchange of the Governor becoming the President of Carter's campaign in Puerto Rico and throwing the New Progressive Party behind the president's re-election efforts. Lopez' fight with Governor Romero, on behalf of President Carter, paid off and was appointed Deputy Campaign Manager of President Carter national campaign. Lopez efforts moved to Puerto Rico and the status issue at the forefront of the National political discussion. Subsequently, both the statehood faction and the commonwealth shared control on a 50-50 basis from 1984 to 1988 and lost control that year as a result of their defeat in an internal primary that year between PPD forces led by then Senate president [[Miguel Hernández Agosto]] and PNP forces led by former Gov. [[Carlos Romero Barceló]]. While the PPD Democratic faction controls the Democratic party chapter under the state chairmanship of former senator [[Roberto Prats]], two of the five DNC members residing in Puerto Rico, Senate president [[Kenneth McClintock]] and [[Francisco Domenech]] are statehooders.

On the Republican side PNP-affiliated statehood Republicans control the GOP local chapter ([[Republican Party of Puerto Rico (1903)|Republican Party of Puerto Rico]]), headed by state chair and [[Aguadilla]] mayor [[Carlos Méndez Martínez|Carlos Méndez]], Republican National Committeeman and Governor [[Luis Fortuño]] and Republican National Committeewoman Zoraida Fonalledas.

The 2008 Republican presidential primary was slated to be held in February, while Democrats held their primary in June. Then Senate President and Democratic National Committeeman [[Kenneth McClintock]], former Sen. [[Roberto Prats]], Puerto Rico's Democratic State Chair and former PPD gubernatorial candidate [[José Alfredo Hernández Mayoral]] were appointed co-chairs of Sen. [[Hillary Clinton]]'s National Hispanic Leadership Council while [[Young Democrats of America]] Democratic National Committeeman [[Francisco Domenech]] co-chaired Clinton's young professionals organization. Prats and McClintock subsequently co-chaired Clinton's Puerto Rico campaign, while [[Francisco Domenech]] became the Deputy Campaign Manager. Senator Clinton won the Puerto Rico Primary by a 68% to 32% margin.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.goppr.org/index.php.en/|title=The Republican Party of Puerto Rico|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090422234520/http://www.goppr.org/index.php.en/|archive-date=April 22, 2009|access-date=January 20, 2008|url-status=dead}}</ref> Being the last big primary before the last two states voted on June 3, Puerto Rico's Democratic presidential primary attracted historic levels of national media coverage.

Several local politicians have expressed concern that Puerto Rico has become a "piggy bank" for presidential campaigns.<ref name="endi">{{Cite web |url=http://www.elnuevodia.com/diario/noticia/politica/noticias/obama_ignoro_consejo/310007 |title=el Nuevo Día - Obama ignoró consejo |access-date=November 7, 2007 |archive-date=November 9, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071109045644/http://www.elnuevodia.com/diario/noticia/politica/noticias/obama_ignoro_consejo/310007 |url-status=dead }}</ref> Recent examples include Vice President [[Dick Cheney]]'s whirlwind two-hour visit to collect $300,000 in 2006 and Senator [[Barack Obama]]'s 50% longer three-hour trip in November, 2007 to collect $200,000<ref name="endi2">{{Cite web |url=http://www.elnuevodia.com/diario/noticia/portada/noticias/llego,_cobro_y_volo/309815 |title=el Nuevo Día - Llegó, cobró y voló |access-date=November 7, 2007 |archive-date=November 7, 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071107045416/http://www.elnuevodia.com/diario/noticia/portada/noticias/llego,_cobro_y_volo/309815 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

Speculation, which began in late 2009 by a national media blog<ref>{{cite web |author=Andrew Romano |url=http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/thegaggle/archive/2009/11/25/absurdly-premature-2012-watch-vol-2-the-governor-of-puerto-rico-for-president.aspx |title=Absurdly Premature 2012 Watch, Vol. 2: The Governor of Puerto Rico ... for President? |work=Newsweek |date=2009-11-25 |access-date=2011-06-13 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091127085950/http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/thegaggle/archive/2009/11/25/absurdly-premature-2012-watch-vol-2-the-governor-of-puerto-rico-for-president.aspx |archive-date=November 27, 2009 |url-status=dead }}</ref> and by [[Grover Norquist]], a well-known Republican commentator, mentioned Gov. [[Luis Fortuño|Fortuño]] as a long-shot inclusion in a national political ticket.