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In 1998 and 2012, a referendum was held on the statehood idea....both reaching just over 50-percent for ‘no’.

I’ve worked in the 1980s with two PR guys and the question of statehood was brought up. Both went to the belief that people are faced with a very controlled ‘theme’ or message by newspapers and radio. Their take was that a large segment of society just believed that territory status was better in the end. But both guys said that the message just didn’t make any sense...except that people didn’t have to pay federal taxes. Both acknowledged that via other taxation gimmicks...the island is basically paying something into the US federal pot of revenue.

I think presently...everyone would look at this (outside of PR) and say it’s a heavily democratic atmosphere, and two more senators would be absolutely democrats. So there’s no thrill to welcome them into the current atmosphere.

Guam? For over twenty years, there’s been interest brewing. One effort was slated recently for a vote, but some federal judge got in the middle and there’s this unique problem...Guam has ‘locals’ (roughly 100,000) and the Chamorro Tribesmen (65,000). The judge says that it’s not a fair vote because the Tribesmen should have their own special say (denial) in this process. There is some belief that a vote might occur by the end of 2018. I’ve never heard anyone state a basis from the island on being anti-state. The one key argument is that you’d hand statehood to a fairly small island (160,000 folks), and give them two senators (unknown if they’d lean right or left).

Playing into this whole game is this ballot in California, on splitting the state. There’s nothing in the Constitution that really allows this....if they do vote this way. You’d have to get all 49 other states to agree on this break-up.

My gut feeling is that more than twenty states would refuse because you’d just be adding four more Democratic Senators to the mix.

Another issue which might pop up is that several other states would probably like to break themselves up, and you might find six to ten states that want a division to occur. Just suggesting PR, Guam, and two more California-like states? Eight more Senators?