It was addressed to Wanda Vázquez, who is set to step into the job later this week.
Some of the protesters who successfully ousted Gov. Ricardo Rosselló after two weeks of rallies appear now to have set their sights on Vázquez, the secretary of justice, who under the territory’s constitution will become governor when Rosselló’s resignation becomes effective at 5 p.m. Friday.
Several hundred people banged on pots and pans while marching in front of her office Monday, demanding that she not only decline to take the governor’s post, but also resign from her current job as well.
“She has acted more like Rosselló’s lawyer than a justice secretary,” said Marta Quiles Jiménez, 33, a San Juan psychologist who was among the protesters.
The latest signs of opposition to Vázquez, who is seen as too close to cover-ups and corruption in Rosselló’s unpopular administration, present a test for the new revolutionary movement that unseated the current governor: Can the loosely organized street protests that mobilized hundreds of thousands of people to oust Rosselló be channeled into longer-term change in Puerto Rico?
Protesters ran Rosselló out of office last week after the release of a series of offensive text messages tapped into long-standing public frustration over corruption, economic problems and a slow response to Hurricane Maria in 2017.
Emboldened by their victory, some of the leaders of the demonstrations are making it clear that their demands went beyond simply ending the governor’s term a year and a half early. They are insisting on fundamental democratic changes in a place where two-party politics traditionally have played out within a relatively limited circle of power. Fears that party leaders are negotiating secret deals to name a crony as the governor’s replacement — or that Vázquez could in fact end up as governor — have already led to the threat of ongoing protests.
“It’s like they haven’t learned a thing,” said Melissa Mark-Viverito, a former New York City Council speaker whom the governor insulted in the chats and who has been participating in the protests. “For them to be striking backroom deals to pick a new governor is everything that the people found repugnant and everything that has the people marching again. You cannot replace one corrupt administration with another corrupt administration.”
Rosselló was forced out after two weeks of immense pressure both on the streets and within his party. The secretary of state, who would normally take the governor’s place, had already resigned over his own role in the bawdy text exchange. That means Vázquez is next in line — unless the ruling New Progressive Party can name and confirm a new secretary of state by Friday.
Party leaders have encouraged the governor to name someone quickly, but no acceptable candidates have emerged.
On Friday, the governor posted photos of himself and Vázquez together planning the “transition.”
But on Sunday, she posted on Twitter that she does not really want the job. “I reiterate, I have no interest in occupying the governor’s post,” she wrote. “It is a constitutional rule. I hope the governor identifies and submits a candidate for the position of secretary of state before Aug. 2, and I have told him so.”
Some news outlets took that to mean that Vázquez was turning down the job. A spokeswoman for her office, Mariana Cobián, clarified Monday that the justice secretary was simply saying that she has never been an elected politician, and does not seek to become one.
“She is a believer and follower of the law and the constitution,” Cobián told The New York Times. “It is what the constitution says, and she will do what the constitution says.”
In recent days, Vázquez has come under fire because she had declined to investigate trailers loaded with unused hurricane aid that were found a year after Maria. Leaked messages showed that she had not only passed on looking into the matter, but also had discussed the issue with the governor’s chief of staff before doing so.
Vázquez, a former prosecutor, had also been the head of the island’s women’s affairs office. The occupant of that position, a 10-year appointment, is supposed to serve as an advocate for women’s issues. Vázquez was the subject of controversy from the start, after suggesting that domestic violence victims should take up arms against their abusers. But feminist groups said that when it came to new policies to help women, she failed to act.
The feminist groups had pushed for the administration to declare a state of emergency after a spike in gender-based violence, but Vázquez, they complained, did not take a position on the matter. She left the position after seven years to become secretary of justice.
Vázquez was briefly suspended as Puerto Rico’s justice secretary last year after she was accused of meddling in a case in which her daughter was the victim of a burglary. A judge cleared her and she returned to her post.
Opposition to Vázquez began building even before Rosselló announced his resignation on Wednesday. The hashtag #WandaRenuncia (“Wanda Resign”) has been shared on Twitter 62,129 times in the past week.
“Instead of being a person who opens a path to justice, she puts up obstacles to favor her party,” said Yaddeliz Martínez, an activist who created a Facebook invite to promote Monday’s demonstration against Vázquez. “If we manage to take down someone who is corrupt, we cannot allow a person who is the same to replace him.
“This is not over.”
René Pérez, the rapper known as Residente, canceled engagements in New York to continue to protest even after Rosselló announced his resignation. “Even if he resigns, the next person in line to be governor is going to be corrupt, so that’s why we have to stay on the streets fighting the same way we fought,” Pérez said in a voicemail message to The Times. “I think we need new faces.”
He noted that the succession rules are enshrined in a constitution that was written not by Puerto Ricans, but rather by officials in Washington decades ago.
Yadira Carrasquillo González, a 45-year-old activist who joined the protest outside Vázquez’s office, said many of those who are still in the streets are hoping to change the status quo in favor of a community-based system in which candidates are chosen not by party leaders, but by the public.
“We want them all to resign,” Carrasquillo said. “My God, yes, let them all go. They are all part of the system of corruption. We don’t want any of them.”
If Vázquez were to decide not to accept the position, the job would fall to the secretary of education, Eligio Hernández, who is fifth in line and has been in his job only since April. The person who is fourth in line, the treasury secretary, would be passed over because the Constitution dictates that the governor has to be at least 35 years old.
The treasury secretary, Francisco Parés, is only 31.
“The people don’t trust anyone who is tied to this Cabinet,” said Alvin R. Couto de Jesús, a lawyer and activist who helped to organize Monday’s march. “Nobody tied to this administration can take that seat. Nobody who has been tainted by corruption should become the next governor.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.