The current economic crisis is a cruel manifestation that territorial status is not a sustainable model for the political economy of America's last large and populous territory.

The most logical and democratic way for Congress to know where we stand as Americans is to allow us an up-or-down vote to confirm or overturn the 2012 results.

I firmly believe independence is not the right economic answer to our situation.

It is way past the time when Congress and the President should have put an end to our disenfranchisement and to our being denied equal opportunities under the laws of our Nation.

How can Congress raise the issue of our non-payment of Federal income taxes when you know that we don't have the power to impose Federal income taxes on income earned in Puerto Rico?

I firmly believe that statehood, economically, is not the alternative.

That is why a 54 percent majority voted to end the current status in the plebiscite of 2012.

We ask Congress to end this tax abuse, and eliminate Section 933 of the Internal Revenue Code immediately.

The current economic crisis is a cruel manifestation that territorial status is not a sustainable model for the political economy of America's last large and populous territory.

To me, that is atrocious. It is unacceptable.

we are hopeful that the court will uphold the legality of the Recovery Act as a means of addressing Puerto Rico's fiscal crisis.

I am sure that, once we put Puerto Rico on the path to statehood, we will grow, we will have a better quality of life, and our people will stay in Puerto Rico.

The problem is that we don't get action from Congress.

The almost 4 million disenfranchised U.S. citizens in Puerto Rico count on your support to secure our equal rights and responsibilities.

H.R. 727 is forceful and ambitious, because the days of half-steps and half-measures on this issue are over.

The problem, Mr. Sablan, is that as I was saying, in Alaska they held a referendum, a plebiscite, years before they came a state.

The time has come for you to recognize that you are masters in somebody else's land.

Puerto Rico has always been treated in discriminatory fashion under Federal health programs