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Federal and local lawmakers in Puerto Rico, as neatly as civil rights and advocacy organizations, have known as for investigations after ProPublica reported how a federal probe into a pills-for-votes plan in Puerto Rico prisons acquired quashed after the 2024 elections.  

The territory’s book in Congress, Pablo José Hernández Rivera, known as on members of the U.S. Home Judiciary Committee on Tuesday to hitch him in a push for a congressional probe into the matter. 

“The picture printed in the present day time by ProPublica particulars info that no elected legit — whether in Puerto Rico or in Washington — can ignore,” he acknowledged in a assertion in Spanish.

The identical day, Gain. Héctor Ferrer Santiago, a Widespread Democratic Celebration member, launched a decision within the territory’s Home ordering its Committee on Public Security to match, calling the allegations “serious!” and announcing the Home has “an inescapable responsibility to match.” 

Their requests came the day ProPublica printed its investigation detailing how prosecutors had uncovered a pills-for-votes plan being lunge by a violent gang in Puerto Rican prisons and were deep into taking a ogle at whether now-Gov. Jenniffer González-Colón or her marketing campaign were attractive. Within the times following President Donald Trump’s election in 2024, as prosecutors ready the indictment, they were beneficial by supervisors within the U.S. Attorney’s Disclose of job for the District of Puerto Rico to exclude the voting-connected costs towards inmates and detention center staff, four sources with knowledge of the investigation beneficial ProPublica. Then, once Trump took pickle of job, they were beneficial to desert the probe into capability political ties entirely, the sources acknowledged.

González-Colón, a longtime Republican and member of the skilled-statehood Original Modern Celebration, has declined repeated requests for interviews by ProPublica. In a assertion Tuesday, she denied any wrongdoing and acknowledged she “has stood firmly towards corruption” for the length of her career and political campaigns. 

“I categorically reject any strive and link me to illegal behavior,” she wrote. González-Colón has no longer been charged with any crime.

She beneficial local knowledge shops Wednesday she doesn’t judge any investigation into the matter is warranted. “There may perhaps be nothing right here,” she acknowledged in Spanish. “And, if they’ve learn from the previous four years, allow them to attain it, allow them to lift it to a winning conclusion. But I have completely nothing to attain with the things that are pointed within the market, powerful less my marketing campaign.”

On Wednesday, leaders of the Puerto Rican Independence Celebration additionally identified as for an investigation. Sen. María de Lourdes Santiago, vice president of the occasion, acknowledged on social media that the questions of partisan intervention in detention center areas must still no longer be pushed apart pondering their “extreme implications.” 

Thomas Rivera Schatz, president of the Puerto Rico Senate and a member of González-Colón’s occasion, before every thing beneficial local knowledge shops that executive officials in Puerto Rico must still compare totally. But at a press conference on Thursday, he backed away from that assertion, announcing of ProPublica’s picture: “I attain no longer lend it any credibility the least bit. … It looks to coach a selected editorial line — one directed towards the Republican Celebration and towards Trump.”

An indictment filed in December 2024, while Joe Biden became still president, charged 34 members of a gang, identified as Group 31 or Los Tiburones, and co-workers with crimes including drug distribution ensuing in a minimal of 4 overdose deaths, cash laundering and possessing a firearm. Prosecutors additionally alleged that the crowd made connections with executive officials “for the reason for reducing detention center sentences” and that the crowd mandated every the prisoners’ political affiliations and “who to vote for in main and customary elections,” however included no costs connected to the pills-for-votes plan.

Sources accustomed to the investigation acknowledged gang leaders forced inmates to vote for González-Colón or face brutal beatings and being slice off from a present of treatment. Most of the inmates are addicted to illicit pills. Prosecutors acknowledged they’d evidence that González-Colón had spoken with one of many detention center gang leaders on WhatsApp exact through basically the predominant marketing campaign and were pursuing other capability ties after they were beneficial no longer to ogle any more, folks with knowledge of the investigation beneficial ProPublica. 

González-Colón acknowledged in her assertion that she engaged with all sectors of society exact through her marketing campaign. “That included meeting with households of incarcerated folks eager by rehabilitation and reintegration, on story of public policy must still be inclusive and attentive to every community,” she acknowledged. She did now not take care of the allegation that she had talked with a gang chief at once. 

W. Stephen Muldrow, U.S. attorney for the District of Puerto Rico, who became appointed by Trump in 2019 and has served repeatedly since, beneficial ProPublica that his pickle of job doesn’t commentary on launch cases. While about a defendants within the drug and cash laundering cases have taken plea agreements, many of the cases are still pending. 

“Given the ongoing nature of the case and the significance of hanging forward the integrity of vigorous issues, it would no longer be appropriate for us to commentary extra in a press atmosphere,” Lymarie Llovet-Ayala, spokesperson for the pickle of job, acknowledged in an electronic mail Wednesday. Beforehand, she acknowledged that charging imperfect public officials “has repeatedly been and remains a chief precedence” of the pickle of job.

As Puerto Rico’s resident commissioner in Congress —  a job equal to a U.S. book — Hernández Rivera has the flexibility to introduce and co-sponsor legislation and vote in committee, however is illegal from voting on ideal passage of criminal pointers within the Home. 

Hernández Rivera, a Democrat and member of the Widespread Democratic Celebration, acknowledged he already has make stronger from a minimal of about a members from the Home Judiciary Committee who’re attracted to initiating the oversight course of and are engaged on a draft letter asking for an investigation.

Political occasions in Puerto Rico don’t adhere to a straight divide amongst Democrats and Republicans. Instead, they center powerful of their focal level on whether Puerto Rico must still become a boom and so have Republicans and Democrats within every.

Hernández Rivera acknowledged the indisputable reality that the Original Modern Celebration has a stronghold on inmate votes is suspicious. “Relating to the prisons namely, it raises eyebrows from a statistical standpoint, the indisputable reality that 83% of inmates vote for the candidate of that occasion when no other pickle in Puerto Rico votes by these margins,” he acknowledged, citing a ProPublica tally of voter returns from the Disclose Elections Commission’s web pages. By comparison, González-Colón obtained 41% of the final vote in her victory within the 5-methodology customary election contest. 

“The subject right here is more about whether the processes were adopted and whether there became corruption in giving up the case,” Hernández Rivera acknowledged. 

U.S. Gain. Glenn Grothman, R-Wis., a member of the Home Judiciary Committee, beneficial ProPublica that while he didn’t but know the particulars of the matter, he would make stronger an investigation. He acknowledged the allegations aren’t tender given the suspicions of election fraud across the U.S. and pondering “in the present day time’s morals.” 

“I’m hoping our committee or one more committee does some investigating,” he acknowledged. 

Annette Martínez-Orabona, govt director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Puerto Rico, acknowledged forsaking an investigation into a faux voting plan in prisons undermines the belief of oldsters that deem in democracy. 

The ACLU is “advocating for beefy transparency about what came about with this investigation … what evidence became aloof, and what became done with that evidence,” Martínez Orabona acknowledged in a written assertion. 

The Energy 4 Puerto Rico Coalition, a diaspora organization that advocates for more independence for the territory, acknowledged it needs solutions from González-Colón and the U.S. Division of Justice. 

“Energy 4 Puerto Rico calls for Congressional hearings to utterly overview what came about, who knew, and why the voting-connected investigation did now not proceed,” Erica González Martínez, director of the personnel, wrote in a assertion. “The Puerto Rican folks deserve the reality.”