Mamdani and Hochul promise a new day for Puerto Rico after Democrats sweep midterms

 

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul pledged more support for Puerto Rico on Friday as it remains mired in multiple crises, asserting during a trip to the island that the sweeping Democratic win in the U.S. midterm elections will be a boon for the U.S. territory.

“There’s a potential in that we can finally start to deliver for working-class people across this country,” Mamdani said. “What we heard today was the fact that so often what’s described as a natural crisis here in Puerto Rico is in fact a political crisis, one that is the result of political choices.”

Hochul said the election results represent “a whole new day” for Puerto Rico and warned that the federal government will be held responsible.

“What we’ve seen over the last two years is really an abandonment of that commitment,” she said. “And we hope to have all those wounds heal, making sure that we continue bringing resources for resiliency, energy projects, building up the grid, as well as healthcare being restored, nutrition programs.”

Mamdani and Hochul are part of a group of New York government officials who are in Puerto Rico for a four-day, annual conference. They met with local nonprofits on Friday as officials announced a $280,000 partnership to help the island confront emergencies.

Puerto Rico struggles to emerge from crises

The partnership between Hispanic Federation and the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York comes as Puerto Rico struggles with chronic power outages and intermittent water shortages while it tries to rebuild from Hurricane Maria and other disasters.

The nonprofit Hispanic Federation said the money would equip 10 community-run resiliency hubs across the island with increased water storage capacity; some also would receive rain-collection systems, kitchen infrastructure and solar power with battery storage.

“We have to start working with the leadership to make sure that the Puerto Rico agenda is not forgotten,” Frankie Miranda, president and CEO of Hispanic Federation, told The Associated Press.

“In Puerto Rico, there are still some huge challenges,” he said. “All the public policies have been so harmful to Puerto Rico.”

The announcement comes months after the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump canceled solar projects in Puerto Rico that were supposed to help thousands of low-income families. One project, worth $400 million, would have seen the installation of solar and battery storage systems in low-income homes and those with medical needs.

The U.S. Department of Energy has said the money initially slated for solar projects would instead be used to help maintain Puerto Rico’s crumbling power grid, which was razed by Hurricane Maria in September 2017. The grid, however, was already weakened given a lack of maintenance and investment.

The decisions prompted outrage on the island as federal support for solar projects fades.

Puerto Ricans sue US government

Last week, six Puerto Rico residents sued the U.S. Energy Department and its secretary, Chris Wright, following the scrapping of a $1 billion federally funded program to provide solar power and battery storage to those who most needed it.

“The cost of such systems remains out of reach for the majority of Puerto Ricans,” the lawsuit stated.

Among those suing is 63-year-old Arecibo resident Ileana Ríos, who is diabetic and needs to refrigerate her insulin. Meanwhile, her son has asthma and needs to use a nebulizer, which requires electricity.

The lawsuit noted that Ríos “regularly loses power when the weather is stable and always loses power during storms, sometimes for several weeks at a time.”

The other residents who sued also have serious health conditions and need equipment or medications that rely on electricity.

The lawsuit requests that a judge order the U.S. Energy Department to reinstate the grant program, among other things. The agency did not return a message seeking comment.

The funding loss has been a blow to nonprofits and others who faced months of uncertainty and confusion as they awaited the Trump administration’s decision on whether and how it would continue the program.

“We had a lot of uncertainty. … At some points it just felt like we were talking to no one,” said Sybelle Rodriguez del Valle, director of operations at the energy resilience nonprofit Barrio Eléctrico, which was part of the U.S. Energy Department program.

Barrio Eléctrico provides electric service to more than 500 families and was poised to provide resilient energy for 1,200 families with funds from the federal program. It had only completed about one-third of its projects before the program ended, losing an estimated $16 million to $20 million in funding.

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Associated Press reporter Gabriela Aoun Angueira contributed to this report.