Clinton, a New Yorker, Has Advantage Among Puerto Rican Voters

Clinton, a New Yorker, Has Advantage Among Puerto Rican Voters

by Associated Press
Thursday, May 22, 2008


SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Forget placards, stoic bodyguards and formal rallies. To win Puerto Rico’s presidential primary, both the Clinton and Obama camps are campaigning in the boisterous, face-to-face “boricua style” favored on this Caribbean island.
The June 1 vote will allocate 55 delegates and might finally give Illinois Sen. Barack Obama the number he needs to claim the Democratic nomination if he picks up enough superdelegates in the meantime. But rival Hillary Rodham Clinton is favored to win here, partly because she’s done better among Hispanics in previous primaries and partly because the New York senator already represents a lot of Puerto Ricans, many with relatives on the island.
Among Puerto Rico’s seven superdelegates, not bound by the primary, Clinton has a 4-2 edge over Obama, with one uncommitted.
“There’s a cultural clash in how campaigning is done” in Puerto Rico versus the mainland, said Roberto Prats, the island’s Democratic Party chairman and a Clinton campaign spokesman. “We suggested they build a campaign ‘boricua style.”‘
“Boricua,” derived from the Taino Indian word for the island’s people, is the term Puerto Ricans use to refer to themselves.
Large, billowing flags are replacing modest placards, staffers for both candidates have summoned their rusty Spanish, and Bill Clinton’s bodyguards were asked to relax during his visit to a sprawling public housing complex.
Obama himself visited briefly last November for a private fundraiser and a meeting with Gov. Anibal Acevedo Vila, who later endorsed him. Clinton’s last visit was after Hurricane Georges in 1998. But the Obama campaign says he will return before the primary, and a local party official says Clinton also will campaign on the island before the vote.