Trump an ‘absolute no’ on statehood

President Donald Trump said in a radio interview broadcast Monday that he is an “absolute no” on statehood for Puerto Rico, citing his running feud with San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz, a critic of the federal response to Hurricane Maria.

“With the mayor of San Juan as bad as she is and as incompetent as she is, Puerto Rico shouldn’t be talking about statehood until they get some people that really know what they’re doing,” Trump told host Geraldo Rivera in an interview Sunday with WTAM Radio in Cleveland, later calling Cruz “a horror show.”

Trump’s assessment brought a rebuke from Ricardo Rosselló, the governor of the commonwealth, who has been making a stepped-up effort to persuade Trump and Congress to support statehood in the wake of the first anniversary of the storm.

“This is an insensitive, disrespectful comment to over 3 million Americans who live in the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico,” Rosselló said in as statement in which he also lamented “the unequal and colonial relationship between the United States and Puerto Rico.”

In the aftermath of Maria, Cruz made repeated public pleas for more immediate aid from the federal government, which angered Trump. The two have continued to spar.

Speaking of Cruz on Monday, Trump said that “with people like that involved in Puerto Rico, I would be an absolute no” on statehood.