Rubio talked about the island’s financial crisis and Clinton took on its health care issues, but the events could not have been more different, except for the shots at each other.
Carlos Giusti / AP
Adrian Carrasquillo/BuzzFeed
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Marco Rubio came out to Pitbull. Hillary Clinton came out to a roundtable of physicians and health care officials.
Friday afternoon in San Juan, both candidates took on serious issues — Rubio, the island's financial crisis, and Clinton, its struggling health care system — but at two very different events. The trips reflect not just Puerto Rican voters who matter in the primary, but also Puerto Rican voters in the crucial state of Florida.
Rubio was up first at Aire Libre restaurant, an open-air restaurant (as its name suggests), where a ceiling fan wasn't enough to tame the sweltering heat.
Nuno Lopez, a member of the island's House of Representatives introduced Rubio, and cut to the chase: The 150 people in attendance should vote Rubio in the Republican primary. Rubio, Lopez told them, has worked closely with Florida's Puerto Rican population during his time as senator.
Puerto Ricans on the island woke up Friday to an op-ed by Rubio in the biggest newspaper El Nuevo Dia, where he came out against the Chapter 9 bankruptcy protection for municipalities in Puerto Rico, arguing that "liberal ideology" has created a "toxic brew of economic stagnation, higher taxes and bloated government," he wrote.
Both Clinton and Rubio's major rival for Florida voters, Jeb Bush, both support the bankruptcy protection approach.
"No organization, whether it's a government, a company, or a family, can survive long-term, spending more money than it takes in," Rubio said.
Dabbing his face occasionally with a small white towel, Rubio said that Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens and serve in the army but can't vote in the general election. He supports letting them decide for themselves, but believes they will choose statehood.
"Puerto Rico has the opportunity, the moment has come to unite with the United States," he said to the loudest cheers of the day. "After 100 years that moment has arrived."
He said the event was his first as a presidential candidate — but stressed it was not his first trip ever. But most of the event was spent answering the same question from Puerto Rican press: Did he support Chapter 9 protection for the island? (No.) Was he sure? (Yes.) Was there any wiggle room on that answer? (Not really.)
As he did in his op-ed, Rubio who spoke in Spanish during most of his 23 minute speech, did leave the door slightly ajar for bankruptcy protection for the island. Answering a question in Spanish, he relented saying, "At the end of the day if it's the only option we need to study it."
And he took a shot at Clinton, when a reporter asked him how he would contrast his plan for Puerto Rico with hers.
"I don't know what Secretary Clinton's plan is for Puerto Rico. I think it was on her server and she wiped it," he said, referring to her private email server.
Then as it began with Pitbull's Echa Pa'lla, Rubio was off, this time with Marc Anthony's Vivir Mi Vida blasting as the event's emcee yelled "Get your cameras ready!" into a microphone and a parade of selfies began.
Source BuzzFeed - Politics http://ift.tt/1VFkFFz
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