Status verified as of 22 September 2026. Political positions change; this explainer describes the documented position on that date.
Current position
Puerto Rico remains an unincorporated US territory. The 5 November 2024 referendum recorded a majority for statehood among the three options offered, but this and all prior referendum results remain non-binding pending congressional action, which had not occurred as of the most recent sources reviewed.[1]
Sources for this page
Each number marks a specific claim. Notes give the source, its locator and how it relates to the claim.
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1.
Claim: On 5 November 2024, Puerto Rico held a status referendum presenting voters with three options — statehood, independence with free association, and outright independence — the first such referendum not to include the current territorial/commonwealth status as an option; the Puerto Rico State Commission on Elections certified final results on 17 January 2025 showing 58.6% for statehood, 29.6% for free association, and 11.8% for independence. The Popular Democratic Party, the Movimiento Victoria Ciudadana, and the Puerto Rican Independence Party denounced the referendum over the exclusion of the current-status option and called for a boycott or spoiled ballots; as with prior referendums, the results are non-binding absent action by the US Congress, to which a Puerto Rican representative presented the results in December 2024.
- 2024 Puerto Rican status referendum results (Puerto Rico State Commission on Elections (CEE)) link, Ballot options, certified results and party boycott positions section. Source record
Printed from https://independenceatlas.com/movements/puerto-rico-political-status/status · last substantive update 24 September 2026.