Brigid Bergin: It's The Takeaway. I'm Brigid Bergin, in for Tanzina Vega, so glad you're with us today. Last week, we brought you the story of Puerto Rico's August 9th primary day. A chaotic scene across the island, where many Puerto Ricans were turned away from polling places that didn't have enough ballots.
This past Sunday, the island held a second day of primary voting, and in the end, Governor Wanda Vasquez has lost the primary of her pro-statehood party to Pedro Pierluisi, a former representative in Congress for the island.
On Monday morning, in Puerto Rico, it wasn't the primary results grabbing headlines; outlets were reporting that the FBI had arrested Puerto Rico legislator, Maria Milagros Charbonier, and three others in connection with a public corruption scheme. It was the latest in a string of cases that have rocked the island with Puerto Ricans speaking out against corruption since last summer's resignation of Governor Rossello.
Nicole Acevedo is a digital reporter for NBC News, and she joins us now to talk about the political situation in Puerto Rico and what to watch for in the days ahead. Nicole, welcome back to The Takeaway.
Nicole Acevedo: Thank you.
Brigid: Let's start with this corruption case. What do we know about it so far?
Nicole: Well, we know that a House Representative from Puerto Rico was arrested yesterday morning. Her name is Maria Milagros Charbonier. She was arrested alongside her husband, her son, and one of the employees in her legislative office. They're facing charges of conspiracy, federal funds theft, bribery, fraud, money laundering, obstruction of justice, among others.
The representative, yesterday, pleaded not guilty to these charges, but when you look at the indictment, it's pretty clear this scheme authority layout on this indictment is the classic kickback scheme, which is a type of bribery.
Brigid: This is a representative who was actually on the ballot over the weekend, right?
Nicole: Yes, and she lost her primary. She was reeling from that loss, really, that morning that she got arrested. These arrests were up in the air. The Feds went to her home last month and they confiscated her phones, iPads. I think that people knew that this was happening and they spoke about that with their votes. They voted her out in the primary.
Brigid: What are you hearing from Puerto Ricans about these arrests? How do they fit into the story of Puerto Rico's Government over the last few years?
Nicole: I would say they really much do, especially last year with the mass protests and the political scandal that ended up ousting former Governor Rossello. People are way more vigilant about what the officials are doing, what corruption is.
Something that FBI officials brought up during their press conference on this case yesterday was that a lot of these behaviors are normalized in a lot of legislative offices in Puerto Rico. I think that people are learning what's wrong. What's right and what's the role in calling out bad behavior, especially on an island that has been facing crisis after crisis.
Right now, Puerto Rico is in a position that they're really dependent on the Federal Government when it comes to recovery money from Hurricane Maria, recovery money for earthquakes. Getting out of the biggest bankruptcy any US jurisdiction has ever seen. The Puerto Rican people are not playing around. They're trying their best to call out officials, and when they see wrongdoing, they either say something or they just vote them out.
Brigid: Now, what was supposed to be the news, of course, was the other recent primary results, namely, Wanda Vasquez's defeat. Why did she lose her bid?
Nicole: Wanda Vasquez, we have to remind ourselves that she is an unelected governor. She's been a controversial figure since the beginning. She rose to power after former Governor Rossello was ousted and resigned. They needed a governor. She ended up rising to power from the sequence of the power structure in Puerto Rico.
Her first crisis that she needed to prove herself as a leader was the earthquakes in January. Right now, she is being investigated by the Puerto Rican Department of Justice about management of emergency supplies during the earthquakes. I think that, also, a little bit like what happened with Representative Charbonier, these investigations, this talk that things are not going well, didn't work well for her. Also, the fact that the primary itself was botched. We have to remind ourselves that, just last month, she signed a law that changed the electoral code in Puerto Rico. That had consequences and it played a role into why this primary was cut in half.
We were talking about results today and yesterday instead of last week when the primaries were originally scheduled to happen. I think that a combination of all these things, just people said, "You know what? We don't want you to stay in office. We don't want to make you an elected governor."
Brigid: Nicole, can you talk about some of the other notable primary results?
Nicole: Yes, this year, we had, for the main opposition party on the island, the mayor of San Juan, Carmen Yulín Cruz, who became known after Hurricane Maria from her disputes with President Trump. She was running for governor against Charlie Delgado and Senator Eduardo Bhatia. She lost that primary by a significant margin, I might add. She came third in her own town of San Juan and Charlie took that win.
I think he won, at least from the votes that were counted as of last night, almost 70% of the votes in that primary. The other notable win was, like you mentioned, Brigid, Pierluisi, who's a figure to watch in the sense that he briefly rose to power before Wanda Vasquez and was governor right after Rossello was ousted for like a weekend until the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico decided that the way he became governor was not constitutional. Right now is just a matter of seeing whether his campaign could sell him again as a governor, and this time have the people elect him.
Brigid: Nicole Acevedo is a digital reporter for NBC News. Nicole, thank you as always.
Nicole: Thank you.
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