Una legislación nueva del Senado de EE.UU. le ofrece opciones más a Puerto Rico para recortar su deuda. Los senadores Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Ed Markey (D-MA) and Kamala Harris (D-CA) presentaron el proyecto de ley intitulado “Ley para el Alivio a Territorios de EE.UU.”. Si el Congreso de EE.UU. aprobara esta ley, los territorios de los EE.UU. que hayan experimentado un desastre natural, podrían cualificar para recibir un alivio en su deuda.

“Puerto Rico continúa luchando con los resultados causados por los huracanes Irma y María” señaló Roberto O González Nieves, OFM, Arzobispo Metropolitano de San Juan de Puerto Rico. “El impacto de los huracanes fue más agudo en la isla por la la crisis de la deuda pública y las políticas de austeridad fiscal implantadas. Legislación como la presentada en este proyecto de ley, puede proveernos más opciones para obtener un alivio en nuestra deuda y a su vez proveer un incremento en la transparencia en las finanzas públicas de nuestra isla”.

El proyecto de ley también crea una comisión para auditar la deuda, de modo tal, que se puedan identificar las causas de esta última.  Territorios de EE.UU., como por ejemplo Puesto Rico, podrían cualificar para el alivio en su deuda, si dos de los siguientes tres criterios se cumplen. Veamos. Primero, si el territorio ha sufrido una disminución en su población. Segundo, si se encuentra recibiendo ayuda federal para desastres naturales. Tercero, si el total de la deuda por persona excede los $15,000. 

Tanto Puerto Rico como las Islas Vírgenes probablemente cumplen con los requisitos de elegibilidad del proyecto de ley del Senado de EE.UU.  

“Más allá del alivio en su deuda, tanto Puerto Rico como las Islas Vírgenes, necesitan que el Congreso autorice más fondos de ayuda para desastres, para poder reconstruir una infraestructura capaz de soportar tormentas futuras” señaló Eric LeCompte, Director Ejecutivo de Jubilee USA. LeCompte también funge como experto en deuda pública para las Naciones Unidas y a su vez colabora con líderes religiosos de Puerto Rico en busca de una solución para la crisis de la deuda publica en la isla. “Sin un recorte significativo de la deuda publica de Puerto Rico, la esperanza para reducir la alta tasa de pobreza infantil en la isla es muy poca, no menos importante, tan poco se podría alcanzar un crecimiento económico sustentable”. 

Lea la “Ley para el Alivio a Territorios de EE.UU 2018”

Read this release in English

The Senate is about to vote on a Puerto Rico amendment to the 2018 Farm Bill. We need you to make a quick call to your Senators now.

Please urgently call your Senators and ask them to support Senators Marco Rubio and Kirsten Gillibrand’s Farm Bill amendment to extend special disaster aid for nearly 700,000 vulnerable people across Puerto Rico.‎

Since hurricane Maria, overall poverty rates have grown beyond half of the island's population. Nearly 60 percent of children in Puerto Rico live in poverty.

Senators Rubio and Gillibrand introduced a disaster relief amendment to the Farm Bill that allows up to $635 million to be spent on Puerto Rico's version of SNAP or the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

Already this year because of your actions, we've won more than $30 Billion in recovery aid and provisions for Puerto Rico to rebuild to withstand future storms. For the last several years, we've moved forward measures for debt relief. Now as we move debt relief forward, this amendment helps us pull back some of the impacts of austerity policies.

Call your Senators now and ask them to support Senator Rubio and Gillibrand’s amendment to secure nutritional assistance for the most vulnerable people in Puerto Rico.

The Farm Bill is moving fast. Please call the Senate now.

Thanks,

Kate

European Finance Ministers endorse a new Greece debt agreement that provides financing in exchange for maintaining austerity policies and economic reforms.

“Parts of the Greece deal provide more breathing space for Greece in the short-term, but we are still concerned that there isn't enough debt relief to keep Greece out of trouble for the long-term," stated Jubilee USA Executive Director Eric LeCompte, who monitors and works on international debt agreements. "I'm also worried that the continued austerity policies hurt too many Greeks and will negatively impact economic growth."

While the International Monetary Fund's Christine LaGarde supports the deal, she raised concerns about the deal's ability to achieve sustainability for the Greek economy.

Eric LeCompte, Executive Director of Jubilee USA was recently quoted in Politico speaking about transparency in disaster recovery efforts in Puerto Rico. Read excerpt below and follow link to full article.

Zinke's political ties to Virgin Islands improved Interior's hurricane response, party boss says

By Ben Lefebvre

Disaster response experts say it would be inappropriate for Canegata's political connections to influence Interior's efforts in the Virgin Islands.

“These are processes that are supposed to be transparent and supposed to be above the board,” said Eric LeCompte, executive director of Jubilee USA, an anti-poverty group that has been involved in hurricane disaster relief efforts. “So, it would not be something a political party would be part of.”

Read more here. 

Friend,

Eric LeCompte
Executive Director

Twitter: @JubileeUSA
www.jubileeusa.org/support-us

Eric LeCompte, Executive Director of Jubilee USA was recently highlighted in The Bond Buyer speaking on emergency relief funds, the bankruptcy process and recovery efforts in Puerto Rico. Read excerpt below and follow link to full article.

Puerto Rico Bond Holders May Have to Wait More Than Two Years 

By Robert Slavin

Some observers, including Jubilee USA Network executive director Eric LeCompte and Council on Foreign Relation Senior Fellow Brad Setser, said the bankruptcy’s progress was reasonable considering the impact of Hurricanes Irma and Maria.

PROMESA “gave Puerto Rico some breathing space by allowing for a debt payment moratorium and preventing creditor litigation," LeCompte said. "PROMESA allowed Puerto Rico to default and made it disadvantageous for new predatory creditors to buy the debt. Finally, the legislation created a super bankruptcy process that is capable of restructuring all of Puerto Rico’s debt.”

LeCompte said PROMESA is the “first comprehensive debt restructuring process since the 1953 London Accord that restructured all of Germany’s debt.” He explained that by this he meant that it was the first time since the London Accord that both state-level and local government level debt was simultaneously restructured.

Read more here.

Catholic News Service and Crux featured articles on the statement issued this week by Jubilee USA and religious leaders on NAFTA and access to medicines in trade agreements. 

Read excerpt below and follow link to the full Crux and Catholic News Service articles. 

Religious leaders say new NAFTA shouldn’t restrict access to medicines

Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio of the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services was one of seven U.S. religious leaders asking that any new North American Free Trade Agreement “avoid enhanced and extended monopolies on life-essential medicines.”

The May 18 letter, sent to President Donald Trump, administration officials and members of Congress, added: “Our faith traditions call us to care for the sick and respond to the needs of the poor in our societies. Trade agreements can have enormous impacts on the ability of the sick and the poor to access the medicines they need for healing and even survival.”

“We agree with the provisions of the World Trade Organization’s Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, currently in effect in all NAFTA countries. The TRIPS agreement calls for respect of intellectual property rights, including those for medicines,” the letter said.

“Crucially, as was underscored by the Doha Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health, it also recognizes each nation’s right to take necessary steps to ensure that medicines are available to all of their residents.”

“This ‘May 10th Agreement’ recognizes the flexibility in intellectual property rights provisions with regard to pharmaceuticals that developing countries sometimes need in order to serve the public health needs of their people,” the letter said. “We hope our political leaders can come together once again on these principles in support of the most vulnerable.”

“We ask that a renegotiated NAFTA reaffirm the TRIPS public health protections that enable the United States and other countries to promote the human right to health and access to medicines for all,” it added.

Eric LeCompte, Executive Director of Jubilee USA wrote an Op-ed featured in National Catholic Reporter called "Vatican's considerations on economic system call us to shape a new one" which talks about the Vatican's recent assessment of the economy in Oeconomicae et pecuniariae quaestiones. 

Read excerpt below and follow link to the full article.

Vatican's considerations on economic system call us to shape a new one

By: Eric LeCompte

The Vatican's recent assessment of the economy reveals a Catholic Church that is alive, engaging and relevant.

It reflects a Catholic Church that sees the suffering tied to our financial system as the church delivers aid to hurricane victims, refugees and homeless people. The document is tied to a church working with other faiths, in Puerto Rico and across the Caribbean calling for transparency, relief and an end to poverty. It illuminates the church that in 1999 helped gather 27 million petitions for the G-8 Cologne Summit, the forum of the world's leading industrial nations, urging the cancellation of debt burdens in Africa and across the developing world.

Not only do we see the continued application of Catholic teaching to understand our economy, the release is a culmination of decades of Holy See efforts to diminish poverty through the United Nations, the World Trade Organization and decision making fora around the world.

"Considerations for an Ethical Discernment Regarding Some Aspects of the Present Economic-Financial System" (Oeconomicae et pecuniariae quaestiones) shows a church spreading the Gospel outside of our church buildings and into the market place. The 15-page release from the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development show a church being relevant to current economic policy debates.

The Vatican's document lifts the reality that God has given us a rich and abundant world so each of us can reach our full potential and that we are closest to the Creator when we share these resources among us.

The global economy should support each individual to achieve their full potential, and each individual must rise to actively shape the economy to this purpose. The Vatican economy document asserts our responsibility to understand that "what is morally unacceptable is not simply to profit, but rather to avail oneself of an inequality for one's own advantage, in order to create enormous profits that are damaging to others."

In closing, the document offers each of us the invitation: "In front of the massiveness and pervasiveness of today's economic-financial systems, we could be tempted to abandon ourselves to cynicism, and to think that with our poor forces we can do very little. In reality, every one of us can do so much, especially if one does not remain alone."