Puerto Rico's primary importance

Three primaries remain in the battle for the Democratic presidential nomination and the next one, the biggest, comes in Puerto Rico.

Never mind that the island isn't a state and that residents of the commonwealth can't vote in November's election, although Puerto Ricans living on the mainland can.

Island residents get to have their say in the competition between Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton in today's primary, which polls suggest Clinton is likely to win and which offers more delegates — 55 — than 27 states and the District of Columbia.

How come Puerto Rico has more convention clout than states such as Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Kansas, Oklahoma and Oregon?

The short answer is that the commonwealth has more people (about 4 million) and that the Democratic Party treats Puerto Rico like a state.

For decades, both major parties have allocated at least a few convention delegates to the island and U.S. possessions such as Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands and American Samoa.

But the Democrats, as part of the national charter they enacted in 1974, mandated that Puerto Rico "shall be treated as a state." The provision was adopted largely in the hopes of wooing Latino voters on the mainland.

The impact of that provision in this year's campaign has been to guarantee that Puerto Rico and its special issues, most importantly the island's political status, get considerable attention from the candidates. Last weekend, Obama and Clinton campaigned on the island, and Clinton returned late Friday.

Obama has not been in Puerto Rico since last week, but his presence is evident. As Clinton's bus caravan motored down a highway outside San Juan on Saturday, it passed a sound truck blaring an Obama Spanish-language ad: "Yo soy Barack Obama y apruebo este mensaje."

As Clinton toured the municipality of Catano on a flatbed truck, a merengue song in her honor boomed from the caravan's sound truck.

And from the streets, shouts of "Hee-lah-reee!"

The Clinton campaign hopes to build her popular vote in Puerto Rico. But officials predicted a turnout of 20 to 30 percent, which would not generate the vote totals she aspires to get.

Puerto Ricans have been U.S. citizens since 1917, and though they don't pay income taxes, they do contribute to Social Security and serve in the military.

Obama and Clinton have agreed, if elected, to support a process in which the federal government would let Puerto Rico conduct a binding referendum on whether it should retain commonwealth status or become the 51st state.

Four plebiscites on that question, which included the independence option, have been held since 1967 with voters opting for the status quo each time. No similar vote is planned at the moment.

Clinton, who has done better than her rival among Latinos throughout the primaries, benefits from being more familiar to Puerto Ricans and from representing, as a senator from New York, a substantial Puerto Rican community.

Obama, by comparison, is considered a relative unknown. It doesn't help that his top local supporter, Gov. Aníbal Acevedo Vilá, was indicted two months ago on charges of fraud and illegal fundraising in connection with previous elections.

For the national Democratic Party, figuring how to afford Puerto Rico the benefits of being a state is no easy feat. It requires considerable mathematical contortions.

The national party's formula for determining how many delegates each state gets is based on two factors: its electoral vote and its popular vote for the Democratic presidential candidate in the previous three elections.

Puerto Rico has no electoral votes. Nor does it cast popular votes for president.

So this year, the Democratic National Committee chose to award the commonwealth a base number of 44 delegates, roughly the same as for states of similar size.

In addition, Puerto Rico, like other places, received a 15 percent add-on — seven delegates — of party leaders and elected officials whose presidential affiliation is determined by the primary.

And it got a four-delegate bonus for holding off on its primary until the final stages of the process.

All of that adds up to 55 delegates, not counting eight additional unpledged superdelegates.

The Republican National Committee, by the way, does not treat Puerto Rico as a state.

At this summer's GOP convention, the commonwealth will have 23 delegates, fewer than South Dakota or Montana, which have far smaller populations, and more only than the likes of Delaware, Vermont and Hawaii.

Material from The Associated Press, South Florida Sun-Sentinel and Seattle Times archives is included in this report.