Strength Of GOP in U.S. Territories

[Webnicz]

The GOP has a decent size delegation in the house made up of non voting members from the territories.
The GOP has also many governors seats and legislative seats in these territories.
My question being, with the significant difference in demographics between these territories and the mainland how does the GOP overcome this in these regions?, what is the cause of conservatism in these areas? and what is the Republican Party's position on statehood for these current territories?(Given the PR referendum passes for example, would the president and congress support statehood)

[RI]

American Samoa has a huge Mormon population, so it would presumably be fairly Republican. Guam's governor is a Republican; their economy is heavily based around US military bases, of course. The NMIs have a long history of GOP governors; both NMIs and Guam are supermajority Catholic. The current governor of the Virgin Islands is a black Independent who used to be a Republican.

[Webnicz]

Should Madeleine Bordallo retire, I would claissify the seat as toss up.

[Ridge]

Good idea, statehood and Senate seats for them.

[Libertarian in Name Only]

What if all the territories were given 3EVs, one representative, and one senator? That way the small populations are terribly over represented?

[SoLongAtlas]

What if all the territories were given 3EVs, one representative, and one senator? That way the small populations are terribly over represented?

"The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote." Amendment XVII

The proposal above would be unconstitutional. They might be given one at-large rep. but they have to have two senators.

[TheSaint250]

The territories should not be able to vote in federal elections.  They are not states and don't have that privilege.  As the poster above said, not only is it unconstitutional, but also states have more rights, and this is one of them.

That being said, I pretty much support the big five territories, especially Puerto Rico, becoming states.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

You would have to merge Guam and the NMI (which were partitioned by an accident if colonial history and rationally should be one region really). There is no way to really get Samoa in though, unless you annexe it as a devolved region of Hawaii.

As for party strength, typically they are very incumbent friendly but swing in Guam straw polls (which has a higher turnout than the general, hilariously). This time it completely went for Hillary.

[Webnicz]

The territories should not be able to vote in federal elections.  They are not states and don't have that privilege.  As the poster above said, not only is it unconstitutional, but also states have more rights, and this is one of them.

That being said, I pretty much support the big five territories, especially Puerto Rico, becoming states.

Admitting the territories as states is a good idea for Dems to mitigate their long-term disadvantage in the Senate.

GOP would benefit the most from this IMO, they are proven strong especially in the NMI where there isn't even one democrat in the legislature.

The District of Columbia should become a state before any of the territories.

[TheSaint250]

The territories should not be able to vote in federal elections.  They are not states and don't have that privilege.  As the poster above said, not only is it unconstitutional, but also states have more rights, and this is one of them.

That being said, I pretty much support the big five territories, especially Puerto Rico, becoming states.

Admitting the territories as states is a good idea for Dems to mitigate their long-term disadvantage in the Senate.

GOP would benefit the most from this IMO, they are proven strong especially in the NMI where there isn't even one democrat in the legislature.

The District of Columbia should become a state before any of the territories.

I'm still pretty skeptical about this (and not, if anyone asks, it's not because DC is solidly Democrat).  I believe in the original purpose for DC: a capital in which one state is not favored.

I have to say, some pro-statehood proposals are worked out to some degree.  The last one, I believe, said that there would be a smaller federal district of important government buildings, and the rest would be the State of Washington, D.C., but I think there would be a lot of trouble in creating and managing such a smaller district that wouldn't have an established local government like Washington, D.C. does now.

[TheSaint250]

The territories should not be able to vote in federal elections.  They are not states and don't have that privilege.  As the poster above said, not only is it unconstitutional, but also states have more rights, and this is one of them.

That being said, I pretty much support the big five territories, especially Puerto Rico, becoming states.

Admitting the territories as states is a good idea for Dems to mitigate their long-term disadvantage in the Senate.

GOP would benefit the most from this IMO, they are proven strong especially in the NMI where there isn't even one democrat in the legislature.

The District of Columbia should become a state before any of the territories.

Also, respectfully, the argument could be turned around, for the Virgin Islands's legislature has no Republicans in it.

I like the idea of statehood regardless of who would benefit in Congress (unless that would be the only reason the territory would want to become a state, which is unlikely).

[Webnicz]

The territories should not be able to vote in federal elections.  They are not states and don't have that privilege.  As the poster above said, not only is it unconstitutional, but also states have more rights, and this is one of them.

That being said, I pretty much support the big five territories, especially Puerto Rico, becoming states.

Admitting the territories as states is a good idea for Dems to mitigate their long-term disadvantage in the Senate.

GOP would benefit the most from this IMO, they are proven strong especially in the NMI where there isn't even one democrat in the legislature.

The District of Columbia should become a state before any of the territories.

Also, respectfully, the argument could be turned around, for the Virgin Islands's legislature has no Republicans in it.

I like the idea of statehood regardless of who would benefit in Congress (unless that would be the only reason the territory would want to become a state, which is unlikely).

I agree, our country should not support a century old imperialism system that keeps many of these places so impoverished.

But I was just pointing out that the theory that making all these territories states "would only benefit democrats" as false. Some of these future seats in my opinion would be some of the hottest contested, especially in the pacific region.