By DÁNICA COTO, Associated Press

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The two parties that have dominated Puerto Rican politics for decades are losing their grip as they face their fiercest competition yet from a younger generation fed up with the island’s corruption, chronic power outages and mismanagement of public funds.

For the first time in the island’s governor’s race, a third-party candidate has a strong second-place lead in the polls ahead of Tuesday’s U.S. election — and some experts say there’s a chance he could win.

“This election is already historic,” said political analyst and university professor Jorge Schmidt Nieto. “I’m already marking a before and an after.”

Juan Dalmau is running for the Puerto Rico Independence Party and Citizens Victory Movement, founded in 2019. A Gaither International poll this month shows Dalmau closing in on Jenniffer González, a member of the New Progressive Party and Puerto Rico’s representative in Congress. He defeated Governor Pedro Pierluisi at their party’s primary in June.

Gaither’s poll shows Dalmau with 29% support to González’s 31%, as he has nearly caught up with her since a different poll in July showed him at just 24% compared to González’s 43%. In third place was Jesús Manuel Ortiz of the Popular Democratic Party, followed by Javier Jiménez of Project Dignity, a conservative party created in 2019.

Under pressure

Puerto Rican politics revolves around the island’s status, and by 2016 the New Progressive Party, which supports statehood, and the People’s Democratic Party, which supports the status quo, will share at least 90% of all votes during general elections, Schmidt said. .

But that year, the US Congress created a federal control board to oversee Puerto Rico’s finances after the government announced it could not pay more than The public debt of 70 billion dollars. In 2017, Puerto Rico filed for the largest municipal bankruptcy in history.

The debt was built up through decades of corruption, mismanagement and excessive borrowing with the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority. still fighting to restructure its more than $9 billion in debt, the largest of any government agency.

Puerto Ricans largely rejected and resented the council, created the year before Hurricane Maria slammed into the island as a strong Category 4 storm, knocking out the power grid.

In 2020, Pierluisi won but received only 33% of the vote. His opponent from the People’s Democratic Party received 32%. It was the first time that neither party managed to reach 40% of the vote.

The power outages that have persisted since the election, along with the slow pace of rebuilding caused by the hurricane, have frustrated and angered voters. Under Pierluisi, the government signed contracts with two companies, Luma Energy and Genera PR, which jointly oversee power generation, transmission and distribution. Outages persisted, with companies blaming a network that was already collapsing before the hurricane hit due to a lack of maintenance and investment.

“Disastrous things have happened in this four-year term, particularly with electricity,” Schmidt said. “It affected everyone, regardless of social class.”

Voters, he said, see Tuesday’s election “as a moment of revenge.”

Dalmau said he would remove both companies in an “organized manner” within six months if he becomes governor. Ortiz said he would cancel Luma’s contract, while González called for the creation of an “energy czar” to look into potential Luma contract violations while another operator is found.

However, no contract can be canceled without the prior approval of the federal control board and the Puerto Rico Energy Office.

The candidates are also under pressure to create affordable housing, lower energy bills and the overall cost of living, reduce violent crime, boost the economy of Puerto Rico, with the island locked out of capital markets since 2015, and improve a system of health that collapses with thousands of people. of doctors are flocking to the continental US.

Dalmau, who suspended his campaign for two weeks in mid-October after his wife underwent emergency brain surgery, also said he would eliminate tax breaks for wealthy US citizens on the mainland .

Apathy dominates

Despite their promises to turn Puerto Rico around, the candidates face persistent voter apathy.

In 2008, 1.9 million of 2.5 million registered voters participated in that year’s election, compared to 1.3 million of 2.3 million in 2020.

This year, nearly 99,000 new voters registered and more than 87,000 reactivated their status, according to the Puerto Rico State Election Commission.

“A much higher number was expected,” Schmidt said.

He noted that the middle-aged and older favor González and her pro-state party, while the under-45s “overwhelmingly” favor Dalmau, meaning that if with a majority of young voters turning out on Tuesday and fewer older ones doing so, he could have a chance to win.

The evil bunny factor

The months leading up to the November 5 election were controversial.

Reggaeton superstar Bad Bunny paid for dozens of commercials criticizing Puerto Rico’s two main parties. In response, the governor’s New Progressive Party funded an ad suggesting an obscenity referencing Bad Bunny.

On Friday, the singer published a one-page letter in a local newspaper mocking González’s pro-state party.

Although the artist did not endorse any local official, the only person he recently started following on Instagram was Dalmau.

Meanwhile, a so-called “cemetery of corruption” was set up in the capital, San Juan, on Thursday with large black-and-white pictures of nearly a dozen politicians from the island’s two main parties who have been charged or convicted by authorities federal. in recent years. It was created by Eva Prados with the Citizen Victory Movement, who is running for Puerto Rico’s House. By Friday, police reported that the images had been destroyed or stolen.

As the race heats up, so have the number of formal complaints about alleged electoral wrongdoing. These include people who say they received confirmations for early voting when they did not make such a request.

A persistent question

Voters on Tuesday will also be asked for the seventh time what Puerto Rico’s political status should be.

The non-binding referendum it will have three options: statehood, independence, and independence with free association, within which issues such as foreign affairs, US citizenship, and the use of the US dollar would be negotiated.