Dear Amigos,
When I signed this petition the Department of Homeland Security had already rejected it. I went ahead and signed it anyway knowing that the more people added their names and voices to it the more pressure towards a reconsideration in favor of the waiver could be attained. The next day President Trump granted a waiver of the Jones Act in PR for 10 days.
In the next couple of days after I signed the petition it reached over half a million signatures. That's a big number and I couldn't be prouder of the many friends on fb who took the time to sign it and show their support! Muchas gracias! But again, this waiver is only for ten days and if you've been following the news, we have immediate and urgent needs to cover in Puerto Rico that will last much longer than 10 days. Then there's the long haul and hard work of rebuilding my beloved homeland. This, I can assure you, will take years.
So I have a dream.
Change is not always easy, but it is always possible. I would like to see the Jones Act be suspended or repealed or abolished in PR. Historically, the Jones Act has been a powerful instrument of colonialism - Puerto Rico is a colony of the United States. Economically, the Jones Act has enabled a monopoly hub for American shipping corporations by virtue of Puerto Rico's colonial status. The government of Puerto Rico has no other option but to hand American shipping industries extra hundreds of millions of dollars annually because of this. When you have an economic crisis like we had in PR way before Hurricane María hit, hundreds of millions of dollars make a significant difference.
This petition is really straightforward in its aim. It asked for a 12 month waiver of the Jones Act toward infrastructure and economic recovery efforts in Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane María. All we want in the short term is for the Jones Act to be suspended for a whole year, but what really needs to happen is for the Jones Act -or its shipping provisions as applied to PR- to be abolished permanently.
So I have a dream that our petition reaches 3.5 million signatures- a little more than one signature for each inhabitant of Puerto Rico. Our population currently stands at 3.411 million. I would like to ask all those of you who didn't sign it when I first shared it to sign it this time around. Would you? Please make sure you read what the petition is all about and read also the updates that have come since it was first introduced- they appear just below the main text of the petition.
If you don't feel like signing it, that's OK. Would you share it then? Sharing this petition with your friends on social media will only make its reach wider which is what we want. This is truly effective and you would be surprised of how many people will be willing to join their voices to this if given the chance. Please give them a chance by sharing this petition with them.
If you sign it AND share it you will be a total super hero! You will have cataclysmic powers and kittens will start raining down from heaven! Being that powerful is a good thing because you can stop the downpour at will. I did it in about 2 seconds. All of that beside the added benefit of helping PR!
The two main addressees of this petition are the President of the United States and the Department of Homeland Security. I anticipate that a few more key players and decision makers in Capitol Hill will be added to it as more signers give their support. For some things there is truly strength in numbers.
Lastly, my heartfelt Thank You! Gracias! to all of you from a Puerto Rican away from home! God bless you all! ¡Dios los bendiga!
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