Monica Ruiz is Vice President of the Pennsylvania chapter of National Puerto Rican Agenda and Executive Director of Casa San Jose in Pittsburgh. There are 500,000 Puerto Ricans in Pennsylvania and the comments have mobilized Puerto Ricans in a way that she has not seen during this election
“We're proud people. We love that island, if nothing else, we love that island,” says Ruiz. “And to call it a floating island of garbage, you've offended so many people, so many people.”
Ruiz says that the comments are unlikely to change the opinions of pro-Trump Puerto Ricans, who were already going to vote for him. However, she says that comments were likely to motivate younger and more apathetic voters to get out to vote.
Additionally, the comments are motivating Puerto Ricans across the state to get more involved in “Get Out the Vote” efforts.
She says that the comments aren’t motivating just Puerto Ricans, but all Latinos.
“I think this will help, because not only did he speak ill of Puerto Ricans and Puerto Rico, but he's also said that Latinos as a whole, like to have lots of children in a very terrible way,” says Ruiz. “And it's just like, you can't, you just can't do those things.”
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